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Unity’s favorite seat. 


Page 5. 






UNITY DODGE 


AND HER PATTERNS. 


KATE W. l^AMILTON, 

Author of “We Three,” “Rachel’s Share of the Road,” 
“Tangles and Corners,” etc. 



EL ,834 






PHILADELPHIA : 

PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, 

No. 1334 CHESTNUT STREET. 



COPYRIGHT, 1883, BY 

THE TRUSTEES OF THE 

PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION. 


ALL BIGHTS RESERVED. 


IZ-dzr/fo 


Westcott k Thomson, 
Slereolypers and Electrotypers, Philada. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 


Lucretia’s “Bettermost Cape” 5 

CHAPTER II. 

Times and Half Times 32 

CHAPTER III. 

John’s Wife 51 

CHAPTER IV. 

“My House” 76 

CHAPTER V. 

“Tom’s Boy” 105 

CHAPTER VI. 

Swept Away 127 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Pattern from Town 147 


3 


4 


CONTEJ^TS. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

PAGE 

A Visit to Flora 167 

CHAPTER IX. 

One Face in the Street-Parade 188 

CHAPTER X. 

Apart from the Sawdust and the Spanoles 213 

CHAPTER XI. 

Not According to the Pattern 241 

CHAPTER XII. 

“As when a Standard-Bearer Fainteth” 260 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Letters and a Telegram 288 

CHAPTER XIV. 

“A Damsel came to Hearken named Rhoda” 305 

CHAPTER XV. 

“By a Way that they Knew Not” 326 


UNITY DODGE. 


CHAPTEE I. 

LUCBETIA^S ^^BETTEBMOST GAPEr 

“ lU OW, I s’pose,” said Lucretia to herself 
as she stood on the back steps and 
rinsed out her dish-towels, while she fur- 
tively watched the small figure perched in 
solitary state on the wood-pile — ‘‘ I do s’pose 
she’s just hankering after something or other 
she hasn’t got, as usual. I never saw such a 
child. I do believe, if there’s anything un- 
wholesome, it’s to be always in a wonder why 
things is and isn’t, and to be hankering after 
something or other. When I was her size, 
I’d have been busy with my doll-house and 
bits of chaney instead of perched up there 
like an owl and practical Lucretia Gill 
gave her towels a final snap, hung them on 


UNITY DODGE. 


their appointed line to dry and retreated to 
her work within-doors. 

Certainly it was a very sober little face 
under the calico sunbonnet on the wood- 
pile. Unity liked that seat. It was near 
the road, and commanded a view of that as 
well as of the farm-yard ; and whatever diffi- 
culty there was in clambering to it made it 
more valuable. Perhaps she had an unde- 
fined feeling that she could think more 
clearly by climbing a little above her ordi- 
nary surroundings. At least, the wood-pile 
was a favorite resort for meditation, and she 
was engaged very much as Lucretia had sur- 
mised. 

‘‘ I wish I had a mother and things like 
other girls. I wonder what makes it all so 
— so different ?” she mused, gravely survey- 
ing her small person, from the dark apron 
that came closely about her throat, down to 
the stout little shoes and the bare brown 
ankles above them ; for Lucretia considered 
that in the summer stockings for children 
were an expensive absurdity. She would 
have dispensed with shoes also for common 
wear, but at that point Unity rebelled. 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPEJ’ 7 

“ Shoes cost a good deal, and money’s short ; 
it’s always short in this house,” remarked 
Lucretia. ‘‘And, seeing your old ones is 
wore out, I reckon you’d better sav'e your 
Sunday ones. You can run about without 
any round home here ; it’s a sight cooler in 
summer-time.” 

But the hot boards and the rough ground 
hurt the tender feet, and still more did the 
sight of those small bare members wound 
the serious brown eyes that scrutinized them 
so thoughtfully. The child walked two or 
three times around the yard, then returned 
to the house and could not be persuaded to 
leave it again. All that day and the next 
she mournfully remained a prisoner, and 
the third morning Lucretia capitulated and 
brought out the “ Sunday shoes.” 

“ There, then ! If you must, you must, I 
s’pose ; but I never saw such a child.” 

Which statement she repeated to the child’s 
father, with the story of her economical en- 
deavor and its failure : 

“Other children ain’t so fussy. Warren 
and Beub always went barefoot, I’m sure.” 

“ Did they ?” Dr. Dodge slowly recalled 


8 


UNITY DODGE. 


his thoughts from abstruse speculations con- 
cerning other worlds to a consideration of the 
atom of humanity before him, and was struck 
with a brilliant solution of the mystery : ‘‘ But, 
you see, Lucretia, she’s a girl.” 

“ Well, so was I a girl,” retorted Lucretia, 
briskly, but that didn’t hinder me from run- 
ning barefoot all over creation ; and it didn’t 
hurt me any, neither. But Unity Dodge 
ain’t nobody else, and never will be.” 

Which last remark contained a far deep- 
er truth than Lucretia realized. Unity her- 
self dimly comprehended the first clause of it ; 
the latter one was the slowly-acquired knowl- 
edge of after-years. Why she was unlike 
other girls, her life different from theirs, 
was a question she often pondered ; the fact 
she never doubted. 

‘‘And I wish I wasn’t,” she whispered to 
herself over the daisies she had gathered 
that morning. “Other folks don’t have 
just Lucretia : they have mothers. And 
their houses are all — ” She paused there. 
The house was a problem to her ; she could 
not tell what it lacked. It was bare, plain 
and unattractive in many ways, yet it was 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST OAPE: 


9 


large and not incommodious. Lucretia cer- 
tainly kept it clean, and fuel and food had 
never been wanting. She had seen smaller, 
humbler homes that possessed the mysterious 
cheer and brightness which she missed in 
her own. 

A whistle came down the road — an ambi- 
tious, self-complacent attempt at an impossi- 
ble tune — and Tommy Jenkins was attached 
to the whistle. He paused as he espied the 
young sentinel oh the wood-pile, and lifted 
his round freckled face to the top of the 
fence : 

“ Well, marm, you’re up in the world this 
morning.” 

The calico sunbonnet gravely nodded. 

“Are you making that daisy-chain to wear 
to the party this afternoon ?” 

“ What party ?” The brown eyes grew 
interested at once. 

“ Over there — Smith’s.” Tommy nodded 
in the direction of a large white house bare- 
ly visible over the hill. “ They’re going to 
have a big time, I tell you. Games in the 
front yard — lawn they call it ’cause they 
moved out from town — tiptop supper in the 


10 


UNITY DODGE. 


house and everything gay. Not a big folks’s 
party : it’s for children.” 

“Are you going ?” asked Unity, with some 
awe creeping into her manner at the bare 
possibility of such a thing. 

“Whe — ew !” whistled Tommy, contempt- 
uously. “Do I look like a girl? Any 
way, there’ll be only a few fellers of my 
size there — them that’s so misfortunate as 
to have sisters, I expect. Why, it’s a girls’ 
party. Their niece or cousin, or somebody, 
is here this summer, and so they’ve invited 
all the girls in the neighborhood. They’ll 
be all fixed up — all ribbons and ruffles and 
curls.” 

Tommy twisted an imaginary ringlet, 
smoothed out a fictitious flounce, and, 
whirling on his heel, marched away. But 
a few rods down the road he looked back 
over his shoulder to call mischievously : 

“ Say ! You’d better go.” 

“ If I only could !” exclaimed Unity, draw- 
ing a long breath. “ If I just only could go 
to one real party !” 

She did not in the least doubt the correct- 
ness of Tommy’s information. He was one 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE: 


11 


of those wonderful boys who seem to have 
an instinctive knowledge of everything that 
has happened or is about to happen within 
a radius of ten miles of them, together with 
an intimate acquaintance with the family 
history, whereabouts and business of every 
one who ventures within the circuit. Unity 
knew nothing of the Smiths or their visitor, 
but Tommy undoubtedly did. She wished 
he had stayed a little longer and told her 
more about it. 

Lucretia’s voice interrupted her medita- 
tion : 

“ U — ni — ty ! Have you gone to sleep up 
there. Unity Dodge? Do run out to the 
barn and see if there’s any eggs. The boys 
didn’t bring in any this morning, and there 
ain’t enough for my pies.” 

Obediently the child clambered down and 
walked toward the old red barn — red origi- 
nally, though ‘‘As long ago as when Dr. 
Dodge’s barn was painted ” was now con- 
sidered an ancient date in village history. 
Soberly the brown eyes peered into nests 
and searched the hay, and carefully the sun- 
burned little hands gathered up the treasures 


12 


UNITY BODGE. 


they found, but thoughts wandered far away; 
and when the commission had been executed, 
Unity rested her elbows on the table at which 
Lucretia was busy, settled her chin between 
her palms and seemed to be intently watch- 
ing the pie-making. But just as the worthy 
housewife began to flatter herself that she 
was giving a useful lesson in domestic high 
art came the irrelevant question, 

‘‘ Lucretia, what do folks have to do when 
they go to parties V 

“Do? Why, nothing, that I know of, 
but put on their best bib and tucker and 
go. But what that has to do with mak- 
ing squash-pies is more than I can see.” 

“I wish I could go,” mused the little 
maiden again and again that morning. She 
wanted to see how a party would seem ; and 
then other girls went to parties, and she did 
so want to be like others. “ I wonder if I 
could go? Tommy said ‘all the girls in 
the neighborhood,’ and I’m sure I’m one. 
He said I’d better go, but then he said 
they’d be all fixed up, and Lucretia said 
so too. I’m ’fraid I couldn’t do it.” 

There was no one to consult. She felt 


LUCBETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE” 13 

instinctively that Lucretia would consider 
the mere idea preposterous and refuse to 
entertain it for a moment. The strong, toil- 
hardened, but not unkindly hands that guid- 
ed the household machinery had a way 
of remorselessly crushing many childish 
fancies. And, as for consulting her father 
or her older brothers, that was a course 
which her wildest flights of imagination 
never suggested to Unity. She would as 
soon have thought of submitting the mat- 
ter to the venerable village minister, of 
whom she stood in mortal awe. 

That afternoon occurred one of Lucretia’s 
rare visits to the village proper — the “ Cen- 
tre,” where the church, stores and offices clus- 
tered, and which, indeed, had lately arrived at 
the dignity of a town. 

‘‘ I’m going to buy some things, and it’s 
likely I may run in to see some folks be- 
sides and stop for an hour or two,” she 
said, coming down stairs with her bonnet 
on, and so first announcing her intention. 
‘‘ I don’t s’pose anybody’ll be asking for 
me ; but if they do, you can tell ’em where 
I’ve gone.” 


14 


UNITY DODGE. 


Unity watched her out of sight. Here 
was an opportunity to settle to her own 
satisfaction, as far as she could do so, the 
problem that had vexed her. She would 
dress herself in her very best attire and 
see how she did look. It was a very lim- 
ited wardrobe ; it allowed no choice in dresses, 
and very little in anything else. When she 
had changed her shoes for a somewhat finer 
pair, donned a light calico dress and wet and 
brushed her short dark hair until she had 
obliterated for the time every trace of its 
natural waviness and made it lie smooth and 
close against her head, she still looked doubt- 
fully into the little cracked mirror above the 
old bureau : 

“I’m ’fraid I don’t look much like a party, 
after all. Tommy said ringlets and ribbons, 
and everything ; and I haven’t any.” 

Suddenly she espied, through the doorway 
leading to the room beyond, an open trunk, 
and in the very top of it something that 
made the brown eyes sparkle — Lucretia’s 
“bettermost cape.” Its owner always called 
it so. She had made it herself, and kept it 
for extraordinary occasions ; and to Unity’s 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE” 15 

childish fancy the cotton lace trimmed with 
rows of narrow bright ribbon was a marvel 
of elegance and beauty. She took it up 
admiringly and put it over her own shoul- 
ders. Next in the trunk lay a silk apron 
of ample dimensions, and after a moment’s 
hesitation she tied it around her waist to try 
the effect. 

‘‘ It ’most covers me ; I’d be pretty nearly 
all dressed in silk with this on,” she said, with 
a sigh of satisfaction. 

Then she walked back and consulted the 
old mirror once more. Certainly it was a 
very unusual image that greeted her, and 
for that reason she concluded it must be 
the more desirable. 

‘‘If I just could wear these,” she solilo- 
quized, “ I’d be dressed up enough for 
anything. I wonder if Lucretia would let 
me, just for once ? I — ’most — believe — she 
would.” 

The last words were whispered very slow- 
ly. Like many an older person, she was 
trying to manufacture a belief which should 
accord with her inclinations, and she reached 
the usual result. 


16 


UNITY DODGE. 


“Any way, maybe I’ll meet her, and then 
I can ask her,” she added, after an irresolute 
pause. “ I guess I’ll meet her.” 

Poor little Unity ! The hardest of all hon- 
esty is to be thoroughly honest with one’s 
self, and she was but a new beginner in life’s 
difficult lessons ; so, having reached her de- 
cision, she took the path in which it was not 
probable Lucretia would come, and breath- 
lessly hurried along it to avoid any possi- 
bility of meeting her. 

It was a flushed, heated little face that 
appeared at the door of the great house on 
the hill, and a very timid voice that an- 
nounced to the astonished lady of the 
mansion : 

“ Please, I’ve come to the party.” 

“ You have !” 

The hall and the parlors beyond were full 
of children, and the ripple of mirth excited 
by the flrst glimpse of the new comer threat- 
ened instantly to become a boisterous out- 
break. Mrs. Smith bit her lip to hide her 
own smile at the oddly-arrayed little flgure, 
and turned to her young guests with a quick- 
ly uplifted finger of warning — a gesture the 


LUCBETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE:’ 17 

shyly drooping eyes prevented Unity from 
observing. 

“ Will you come in, then, and go up stairs 
with me to lay off your hat ?” 

The child obeyed, but as they ascended 
the stairs the lady fancied the peal of 
laughter that sounded from the hall was 
scarcely called forth by the game that had 
been in progress. 

A younger lady ran swiftly up after them, 
and whispered, as she saw the vexation on 
Mrs. Smith’s face, 

“You really cannot blame them. That 
monstrous apron flopping so far below the 
short dress in front is too funny for any- 
thing. She looks dressed for a masquerade. 
Where did she come from ?” 

In the quiet upper room Mrs. Smith lin- 
gered in some perplexity. 

“ I do not think I know you, my dear,” 
she said, kindly. “ What is your name ?” 

“ Unity Dodge.” 

The name conveyed little information to 
the questioner, but the younger lady at 
once remarked, “ You are Dr. Dodge’s lit- 
tle daughter, then ?” and added, in a rapid 


18 


UNITY DODGE. 


aside to the hostess, “ Lives about a mile 
down the road, in that farmhouse where 
everything has the appearance of being 
allowed to tumble down at pleasure. The 
doctor is so absorbed in signs and wonders, 
stars and constellations, that the members 
of his family have a fine opportunity to 
shoot out of their proper orbits. This is 
an illustration, I presume.” 

Unity caught but little of the explanation, 
and understood none of it. She heard more 
clearly Mrs. Smith’s answer: “Motherless? 
Poor little chick!” and already she began 
to feel saddened, disappointed and thor- 
oughly uncomfortable without at all know- 
ing why. 

“Wouldn’t it be better to leave your apron 
up here ?” suggested Mrs. Smith, after a mo- 
ment’s pondering. “ I think it would.” 

“ Why, it’s silk !” exclaimed Unity, in 
dismay at the proposition. 

“ So it is, and a very good one too ; but 
none of the little girls are wearing aprons 
to-day.” 

Unity pulled it aside and looked doubt- 
fully at the calico dress. 


LUCBETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE,” 19 

‘‘ I’m ’fraid — Will I be fixed up enough ?” 
she asked. 

‘‘ I think you will. Let me untie it for 
you.” 

She longed to dispose of the cape also, 
but the child’s grave face and changing 
color made her shrink from suggesting it. 

“ But I’m afraid she won’t have a min- 
ute’s peace down stairs,” she whispered to 
her friend. 

‘‘Oh yes, she will ; don’t be troubled about 
her. She lives near here, you know, and 
doubtless is acquainted with many of the 
children. She will enjoy herself, never 
fear.” 

The lady’s face brightened : 

“ I did not think of that. Probably you 
are right.” Then she turned to Unity : 
“ Shall we go down now ?” 

Half longing to go, yet half afraid to 
venture, the little girl signified her assent. 
That large upper room was very pretty, and 
it was so quiet that she began to wish she 
might be allowed to remain there and catch 
only such glimpses of the party as could be 
obtained from the top of the stairway ; but 


20 


UNITY DODGE. 


Mrs. Smith was already leading the way, 
and she timidly followed, and a moment 
later found herself in one of the well-filled 
parlors. 

‘‘ This is Dr. Dodge’s little daughter, who 
has come to help us enjoy this afternoon, and 
I hope you will all try to make it pleasant 
for her. I presume many of you are well 
acquainted with her already,” said Mrs. Smith, 
deciding that, in the circumstances, a general 
introduction, quickly got through with, would 
best answer her purpose, and trusting that the 
child would drift naturally to those she knew 
and soon feel at ease. 

Called away a moment later, she had no 
opportunity of watching the success of the 
experiment, but her friend and assistant for 
the day laughingly banished her misgivings: 

“ Odd little creature ! Of course she knew 
some of the children who were invited, or she 
could have known nothing of the party and 
would never have thought of coming.” 

Seeking refuge in the first corner that 
offered a vacant chair. Unity watched the 
merry groups around her. How pretty they 
all were in the light dainty dresses and bright 


LUORETIA^S ^‘BETTERMOST OAPEJ’ 21 

sashes ! No, she certainly did not look like 
them ; and for a few minutes nothing but 
the comforting consciousness of wearing Lu- 
cretia’s best cape gave her courage to retain 
her place and look about her. 

Mrs. Smith’s friend had been incorrect in 
her surmise : Unity did not know the other 
children. Some of the faces she recognized ; 
a few of the names she knew ; but that was 
the extent of her acquaintance with them and 
of theirs with her. She did not attempt to 
join in any of the games; no one invited 
her to do so, indeed. After a time, when 
the others became fully engrossed in them 
again and forgot to look at her, she grew 
more accustomed to the scene and began to 
enjoy watching it. 

Presently the youngest of the party — a 
little four-year-old who was trotting about 
in baby unconsciousness, alternately petted 
or pushed aside by his elders — discovered 
Unity to be at leisure, and, slipping a beau- 
tiful book from a table, brought it to her 
with the request that she would “ tell about 
the pictures.” The brown eyes sparkled, 
and for the next half hour she was bliss- 


22 


UNITY DOBOE. 


fully occupied with the engravings and her 
tiny companion. The hostess, looking in 
for a moment and seeing her bright face, 
was so entirely satisfied that she quite for- 
got her afterward. 

The brightness was of short duration, 
however. Baby tired of the pictures, and 
wandered off to try his tiny fingers upon 
the piano. The rattling and jingling he 
evoked soon drew the attention of the older 
ones ; he was dispossessed of his seat on the 
piano-stool, and one after another the girls 
began to display their, proficiency — or lack 
of it — in music. Most of them were at an 
age when they were exceedingly well satis- 
fied with their own acquirements, and their 
laughing ease and glee, their seeming famil- 
iarity with the wonderful instrument, awed 
poor Unity. She watched the fluttering 
white fingers and the players, then looked 
down at the little brown hands that lay in 
her own lap, and grew more and more un- 
comfortably conscious of her own deficien- 
cies. Then supper was announced, and 
reluctantly she left her obscure corner and 
followed the rest. The change threw her 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE,’^ 


23 


into close proximity with the others again, 
and in the dining-room she found herself 
seated beside a boy some three or four years 
older than herself, who examined her with 
mischievous eyes. 

“Are you Cinderella ?” he inquired. 

“No,’’ she answered, wonderingly. “Why?” 

“Why, I didn’t know, you see. It sort 
of seemed as if you might have started out 
when your folks were away from home, but 
I thought, if your fairy-godmother invented 
the rig, she must have been short of material. 
So your name isn’t Cinderella ?” 

“ No, it’s Unity Dodge,” she assured him, 
gravely. 

“ U — ni — ty Dodge ! Well, I’ve heard 
of the ‘ honest dodge ’ and the ‘ artful 
dodge,’ but I never heard of a unity dodge 
before. Did they give you that name be- 
cause you are all together and the most of 
your family scattered?” 

“ I don’t know,” said Unity, with flushing 
cheeks. She did not understand him, but 
she strongly suspected that he was ridicul- 
ing her. 

“ They are bringing around the fruit and 


24 


UNITY DODQE. 


ice-cream now,” he remarked, in a moment. 
‘‘ Don’t you always take yours with salt in 
it? Just try it that way, and see if .it isn’t 
delicious.” 

A girl sitting in front of them — a tall, 
slender girl with sallow face and dark 
eyes — turned at that instant and surveyed 
Unity with a cool look of pity and the boy 
with a still cooler look of contempt. 

You may think that is very funny and 
very witty, George Shirley, but I don’t,” 
she said. — “Little girl, if you choose to 
come here and sit by me, I’ll see that you 
have your supper in peace.” 

Unity gladly obeyed, and accepted the 
seat from which the silken skirt was swept 
away to make room for her. She was some- 
what abashed in this new presence, but it 
was far preferable to the one she had left. 
Her young protector had promised that she 
should have her supper and be allowed to 
eat it undisturbed, but she evidently in- 
tended nothing more; for, beyond seeing 
that the child was helped to the viands as 
they were passed, she paid her no attention. 

A little later Mrs. Smith noticed them 


LVCBETIA^S ^^BETTEBMOST CAPE:^ 25 

and smiled approvingly upon the elder 
girl: 

“ That is very kind of you, Margaret, my 
dear. I am glad you are interested in our 
little stranger.” 

“ Oh, I haven’t been kind, and I’m not at 
all interested,” answered Margaret, with calm 
frankness: “I only didn’t want her tormented. 
I took a kitten away from some boys the other 
day — but I don’t like cats.” The last sen- 
tence was uttered reflectively — rather to her- 
self, it seemed, than to another. 

Mrs. Smith passed on with a curious ex- 
pression upon her face, and there was a 
wondering look on Unity’s as she stole a 
sly glance at her companion. Margaret 
was her senior by some four or five years, 
and her tall, slender figure, cool, unchildlike 
face and self-possessed manner made her ap- 
pear much older than she was. Mrs. Smith’s 
remark had, however, produced some impres- 
sion, for after a moment she turned and looked 
more attentively at her small protegee. 

“Did you tell that boy your name was 
Unity?” she suddenly demanded. “What 
made them give you such an odd name?” 


26 


UNITY DODGE. 


’Cause it was almost the last word my 
mother spoke when she was dying — when 
I was a wee baby,” explained Unity, timidly, 
not quite knowing whether this stately young 
lady would view the peculiar circumstances 
as any extenuation. 

“ Your mother is dead, then ?” Marga- 
ret’s face softened a little: she also was moth- 
erless. ‘‘ Did anybody dress you up to come 
here ? or did you run away ?” 

“ I — I came when nobody knew,” admitted 
Unity, forced into confession. ‘‘My folks 
don’t know much about parties.” 

“I should suppose not. Well,” with a 
still keener scrutiny, “you wouldn’t look 
so bad if you hadn’t your hair tied back in 
that tight, straight way, and if that — 
Come up stairs after supper, and I’ll fix 
you over a little — ” she interrupted herself. 

Half grateful for what she dimly perceived 
to be an unusual effort on the part of her 
companion, half humiliated, though with- 
out comprehending why. Unity slowly nodded 
her acceptance of the proposal. She would 
scarcely have dared to decline even had she 
wished to do so ; and when, as they passed 


LUCRETIA'S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE:’ 27 

into the ball again, Margaret said, ‘‘Now 
come,” she followed silently. 

The pleasant dressing-room was unoccu- 
pied, much to Margaret’s satisfaction, and at 
once she began her self-imposed task. She 
drew the brown hair from its close confine- 
ment, gave it a few skillful touches with 
brush and comb, let it fall a little lower on 
the forehead and allowed its natural curli- 
ness to appear : 

“ There ! that’s better. Look !” 

The glass clearly indicated an improve- 
ment, and Unity’s eyes acknowledged it at 
the first glance. 

“As for the rest,” pursued the young 
dressing-maid, glancing doubtfully over her 
attire, “ I don’t know. If you want to wear 
this,” touching the cape, “ it wouldn’t be so 
very bad if it were a little shorter here, so 
the ends could tie back like a sash and, 
catching up a pair of scissors, she hastily 
cut into the lace and ribbon. 

“ Oh !” gasped Unity, in horror, divining 
her intention only by its accomplishment 
and shrinking as if the flimsy fabric had 
been her own flesh. 


28 


UNITY DODGE. 


Why, what’s the matter ? I didn’t hurt 
you,” began Margaret, in astonishment. 

But the color that for an instant had 
crimsoned the child’s cheek and brow van- 
ished. She sank down in a chair and, 
covering her face with her hands, sobbed 
piteously : 

“Oh, what shall I do? You’ve cut it! 
you’ve cut it ! And it’s — Lucretia’s — bet — 
ter — most — cape !” 

“Well, I’m sure I didn’t think the absurd 
old thing was of any value,” said Margaret, 
with a dismay that was considerably tinged 
with disgust. “ I’m very sorry,” she added, 
rather stiffly. She had no sympathy to offer 
for a grief that seemed so utterly uncalled 
for and so incomprehensible ; but no words 
could just then have availed anything with 
the poor forlorn little maiden. 

Mrs. Smith, suspecting that Unity might 
have left home without permission, sought 
her with a package of cakes, to advise, as 
delicately as possible; her early return. 
But the suggestion was unnecessary. The 
child had already made her preparations 
for departure, and, with her coarse straw hat 


LUCRETIA^S ^^BETTERMOST CAPE^ 29 

pulled low over her eyes, was anxious only 
to escape from the house. 

Such a heavy little heart it was, such 
weary, lagging feet, that slowly went down 
the long road ! A miserable failure had 
the whole experiment been. Going to a 
party with other girls had not made her like 
them. She had been different all the time ; 
everybody had seen it and known it; and 
now had come this wretched ending. She 
would never try again, she whispered to 
herself with trembling lips, and she never 
wanted to see any of them again — never! 
In the depth of her childish grief and 
shame she almost wished she could die. 

We speak lightly of childhood’s sorrows 
because we understand them so little. To 
the latest day of her after-life Unity could 
distinctly remember how dreary the long 
stretch of road looked that afternoon, the 
soiled and dusty daisies by the wayside, and 
a bird perched on the straggling rail-fence 
that so mockingly chirped his good-night 
song. 

She had stopped crying. Her heart 
seemed to herself too numb and despairing 


30 


UNITY DODGE. 


to care much for anything any more — even 
for Lucretia’s condemnation, which was 
sweeping and unstinted. That she had 
known no better than to go to a party 
without an “ invite ” ! What must they have 
thought of her? Then to slip off without 
permission, and to borrow her — Lucretia’s 
— things without leave, and finally to ruin 
her best cape ! She rehearsed it all in gen- 
eral and in particular, and painted it in its 
full enormity. 

“And now. Unity Dodge, you’ll go straight 
to bed without a bite of supper, or I declare 
for’t I’ll tell your pa all about it,” she con- 
cluded. 

Supper Unity had already had, and her own 
bare little room, where no human eyes could 
look upon her, was the one ark of refuge she 
was longing to reach ; so she gladly crept 
away up the back stairs as soon as she was 
allowed to do so. She did not know what 
her father would think of the transaction. 
Of course he would be angry, and perhaps 
he might be dreadfully mortified, too, be- 
cause she had gone without an invitation. 
Oh, if she had only known about that! 


LVCBET1A*S ^^BETTEBMOST CAPE” 31 

“ But I didn’t do the best I knew how, or 
I wouldn’t have slipped off so,” she finally 
acknowledged to herself in the midst of her 
trouble and self-abasement. 

Stirred by her own conscience, but still 
more by Lucretia’s estimate of her misdoing, 
she dared not lay her aching little head upon 
its pillow until she had whispered a prayer 
for pardon, even though her only thought 
of God was linked with the dread inspired 
by her father’s constant searching into signs 
and wonders and his frequent predictions 
of coming woes. She had little knowledge 
of heavenly tenderness, yet doubtless the 
plea she sobbed out had more weight there 
than it had in Lucretia’s judgment : 

‘‘I’m just me, and I’ve no mother, like 
other little girls!” 


CHAPTER II. 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 

N otwithstanding her half prom- 
ise not to report the matter to Dr. Dodge, 
at the breakfast-table Lucretia could not re- 
sist the temptation of recounting Unity’s 
dehut in fashionable society. She had been 
greatly mollified by the package of cake 
left on her work-stand, and by discovering 
that her cape could easily be mended. The 
next morning the whole affair appeared to 
her in an exceedingly ludicrous light — en- 
tirely “ too good a joke to keep,” as she ex- 
pressed it ; and she accordingly related it in 
detail to the older members of the family. 

It was not usually easy to arouse Dr. Dodge 
toany very animated interest in passing events, 
but the one thing in this sublunary sphere that 
he occasionally noticed, and always to mention 
with a sneer, was what he termed the “ fuss 
and feathers of fashionable simpletons.” All 

32 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 


33 


stylish dress, house-furniture, entertainments 
and modes of life generally, were indiscrimi- 
nately condemned as ‘‘silly, extravagant and 
absurd,” and the sole plan he had ever been 
heard to express concerning his daughter’s 
education was that her “ head should not be 
filled with foolish new-fangled notions.” 

Lucretia’s recital delighted him : 

“ Marched right in among them in that 
rig, did she ? Well, that was plucky ! A 
regular take-off of all their fuss and finery.” 
The doctor leaned back in his chair and 
laughed, and even sober, undemonstrative 
John smiled very broadly. “ Rigged her- 
self in anything she could pick up, and 
then called herself as fine as anybody and 
marched coolly into the middle of their 
party ! I do believe she’s a clear Dodge, 
that girl. I declare, it was plucky ; I’d 
have given something to see it. — See here. 
Sis : dollars aren’t plenty with me, but that 
was worth one, and you shall have it to buy 
whatever you please;” and the doctor pulled 
out his old wallet, and, searching out a silver 
dollar, placed it in Unity’s hand. 

That was an unexpected outgrowth of her 

3 


34 


UNITY DODGE. 


yesterday’s tribulation, but Unity scarcely 
knew whether Lucretia’s reproaches or her 
father’s laughter had been hardest to bear. 
The kind of approval he had manifested 
only the more fully convinced her that she 
had committed some dreadful blunder, and 
she sat on the low doorstep and looked down 
with a very sober face upon the money in 
her hand, while she tried to decide what to 
do with it. She had offered it to Lucretia 
first, to buy a new cape. 

“ Dear me, no, child ! What should I do 
that for?” said Lucretia, with her good-na- 
ture fully restored. ‘‘ I wouldn’t have cared 
so much about it last night if it hadn’t been 
my very better most. I looked it over this 
morning, and I see I can mend it up and 
put a little more ribbon over it, so it’ll 
never show and be as handsome as ever. 
You just buy whatever you like. You 
may go up to the Centre alone, if you want 
to, and buy whatever you please.” 

What did Unity want to buy? Yesterday 
she would have liked twenty things, any one 
of which this might procure, but to-day she 
did not care for them : 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 35 

“ It wouldn’t make any difference if I had 
them ; I’d be just Unity Dodge. And my 
very name is queer : they said so. Besides, 
they didn’t think Lucretia’s cape was pretty, 
either; that Margaret-girl called it ‘horrid.’ 
I won’t try any more, and I won’t care.” 

So, in a spasm of what Lucretia called 
“ hard common sense ” — it certainly was 
hard — she trudged up to the first store, 
picked out a stout gingham, in womanly 
fashion inquired into its washing and 
wearing qualities, as she had heard Lu- 
cretia do, and bought it without the least 
regard to its lack of beauty. 

Notwithstanding her determination not to 
care. Unity did long for some encouragement 
in her course when she reached home and 
viewed its ugliness afresh. It was so far 
removed from anything like “ fuss and 
feathers ” that she thought it must appear 
to her father something eminently sensible, 
and a new idea occurred to her. 

“Do you think he gave me the money 
’specially, you know — Do you think 
father’d like to see what I bought?” she 
asked, timidly, of Lucretia. 


36 


UNITY DODGE. 


That worthy woman paused to reflect. 

“ Well, I don’t know,” she answered, 
doubtfully. You might try.” 

So Unity went up stairs to the large room 
where books, papers, jars, bottles, surgical 
instruments, charts and long tables of figures 
appeared, to an uninstructed eye, to be rev- 
eling in dust and disorder ; for in that 
apartment the doctor would allow no ‘‘set- 
ting to rights” but his own. He opened 
the door after Unity’s hesitating knock had 
been twice repeated, but he held a paper 
in one hand and a book in the other : 

“ Well, child, who’s sick now ? I can’t 
be disturbed unless it’s a very serious case, 
I really can’t.” 

“ Nobody’s sick ; it’s only me. I — ” 

“ You ? Can’t Lucretia give you some 
catnip or a warm bath, or something ? She 
ought to know what to do — a woman of her 
age,” said the doctor, with his eyes wander- 
ing back to the paper he held. 

“ I’m not sick, father ; I just bought my 
dress,” explained Unity, half retreating. 
“ The money you gave me, you know.” 

“ Somebody gave it to you, eh ? Yes, it’s 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 


37 


pretty — very pretty. But run away now, 
for I am exceedingly busy.” He had en- 
tirely forgotten the talk of the morning. 

The child glanced at his face and slowly 
withdrew. 

‘‘ What did he say ?” questioned Lucretia 
as she quietly came back to the kitchen. 

“ He didn^t say — anything,” hesitating 
over the reply. 

“ Now, I’ll venture he didn’t, either,” 
soliloquized Lucretia, watching the little 
girl as she went back to her seat on the 
steps. ‘‘ He’s so amazingly busy trying to 
find out about the times and half times of 
Daniel that he never finds out his own 
family don’t have no kind of times. If 
he’d just let the wheels of ’Zekiel alone 
and grease up the wheels of his own old 
chaise, and ’tend to pills instead of prophecy 
for a while, there’d be less need to scrimp 
and save and make one dollar do the work 
of two in this house. It’s a body’s duty 
to study the Bible — I’m willing to allow 
it is,” admitted Lucretia, a little reluctantly 
as she remembered her own remissness in 
that line — ‘‘ but letting everything else go 


38 


VNITY DODGE. 


and trying to study signs and mysteries, 
so’s we can calculate when the end of the 
world will come, ain’t the use we was put 
into the world for, nohow. I don’t believe 
it !” 

Not in the least would Lucretia’s opinion 
have troubled the doctor even had he known 
it. He was again absorbed in his books and 
papers the instant the interruption had 
ceased. There had been a time when 
medical works occupied his study-hours, 
but that was long since past. Now; as he 
sometimes exultantly assured himself, he 
was “studying the symptoms and feeling 
the pulse of the universe,” and it did not 
occur to him that his great subject profited 
by none of his prescriptions and paid him 
no fees. In earlier years he had gained quite 
a large practice for a country physician, and 
that, with the proceeds of the farm, had 
placed him in comparatively easy circum- 
stances. With no ambition for a preten- 
tious establishment and a contempt for fash- 
ion and all its requirements, his one idea of 
luxury had been books and scientific appli- 
ances. These he had been amply able to 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 


39 


secure and to support his family in the sim- 
ple, homely style which was all he cared to 
maintain, and which his wife, who always 
seemed rather a pale reflection of himself 
than a separate and positive individuality, 
never seriously attempted to change. 

What had first turned the doctor’s studies 
into their present channel it would be diffi- 
cult to recall. Some book that came to his 
hand, perhaps, some lecture or newspaper 
article, had aroused him to an advocacy or 
a refutation of its theories. However it 
happened, a pamphlet of his upon prophecy 
and the signs of the times awakened, unfor- 
tunately, a wider than local interest, and so 
stimulated him to further writing and re- 
newed research. If he did not really be- 
lieve that the mantle of the prophets had 
fallen upon him, as some of his neighbors 
asserted, he at least became convinced that 
he was a very keen and skillful interpreter 
of prophecy ; and the farther he pursued 
the subject, the more fascinated he became. 
He attended the meetings of ‘‘ Millerites ” 
and ‘‘Adventists,” wholly agreeing with 
none of their views, but revising and sub- 


40 


UNITY DODOE. 


stituting theories of his own wherever it 
seemed to him necessary. 

That first faint puiF of fame was all that 
came to Dr. Dodge. His later papers and 
treatises attracted little attention, but, absorbed 
in his investigations, he scarcely noticed the 
fact. Meanwhile, his medical practice gradu- 
ally decreased. People whispered that the 
doctor thought the next world so near at hand 
that he did not consider it worth while to ex- 
ert himself much to keep his patients in this 
one. In truth, his mind was so occupied 
with other thoughts that he found it difficult 
to give his patients the care and considera- 
tion he had once bestowed. He grew absent- 
minded, forgetful, and sometimes neglectful ; 
so, when a young physician settled in the 
village — one alert, well read and skillful, 
keeping himself well informed and profiting 
by all new discoveries in his profession — 
Dr. Dodge’s practice naturally drifted to 
him. The farm suffered also. Hired help 
with little oversight greatly drained its 
profits, and fences, outbuildings, the farm- 
house itself, told a story of neglect. All 
these changes came slowly, and the doctor, 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 41 

busied with the wheels of Ezekiel’s visions, 
did not notice that those of the domestic 
machinery “drave heavily.” 

When little Unity, the one daughter of 
the house, was born, the tired-out, spiritless 
mother died. Already she had seen that 
which made her fear the possible disintegra- 
tion of the family, and her last words were a 
feeble wish that they might ‘‘all live to- 
gether in unity.” The desire gave a name 
to the wee motherless maiden, if it accom- 
plished nothing more. 

Strong-armed, practical Lucretia Gill — 
a very distant relative of the family, who 
had taken care of Mrs. Dodge in her illness 
— remained in charge of the household, and 
the doctor went back to his books and buried 
himself more deeply than ever in his studies. 
Now by one key, now by another, he was 
sure he had obtained the means of unlocking 
the mysteries of the Revelation and of pro- 
claiming to the world “ the times and sea- 
sons which the Father hath put in his 
own power.” When one ingenious method 
of calculation failed, he devised another; and 
again and again he was certain he had dis- 


42 


UNITY DODGE. 


covered the exact date of that day which 
the Christ himself has declared no man 
knoweth — “ no, not the angels of heaven, 
but my Father only/’ 

Throughout all her childhood Unity had 
heard very little of the loving, pitying Lord 
who blessed the children, healed the sick and 
died to save the guilty, very few of his 
teachings of gentleness, unselfishness and 
trustful love. But she had heard much of 
woes, signs and wonders, of seals ” and 
vials,” until she shrank from the sight of 
a Bible, and shuddered sometimes when she 
saw through her father’s window the light 
which was often burning far into the night. 
Almost it seemed as if some awful incantation 
were in progress there to hasten the coming 
of rending skies and crumbling worlds. 

Once she had spent an entire day — one of 
those set apart by her father’s prediction as 
the date of dire events and wonders — in an 
agony of apprehension and terror too great 
for words. She had started at every sound, 
and had been shocked and frightened at the 
indifference of Warren and Beub, who on a 
morning like that could pack lunch-basket 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 43 

and tackle and calmly go off on a fishing- 
excursion. For hours she had hidden away 
in the old barn, trying in her ignorant, 
childish fashion to pray and make herself 
“ good,” and trembling at every creaking of 
the great door, every rustling of the wind in 
the trees, until at last the long, bright after- 
noon wore itself away in purple and gold 
and the sun went down as peacefully as 
ever. She was relieved, but bewildered ; 
and afterward she ventured to ask Reub — 
the brother nearest her own age, though five 
or six years her senior — if he had not been 
alarmed. 

‘‘ No ; I didn’t believe much about it.” 

“ But how could you help it ? Father 
said so. 

‘‘ Well, father thinks so many things, you 
see. I don’t know, only he said the same 
thing before and it didn’t come,” answered 
Beub, hesitatingly. 

After that, though the predictions always 
troubled her. Unity was able to receive them 
with a few grains of comforting doubt. Her 
father was certainly very wise, but then, as 
she whispered to herself with better logic 


44 


UNITY DODGE. 


than rhetoric, “he sometimes don’t always 
know.” 

The old farmhouse was a shelter, but not 
a home. It held the different members of 
the family, but for years there had been no 
family-life. Lucretia kept the house clean, 
the rooms in order, prepared the meals and 
saw that the clothes were properly washed, 
ironed and mended ; and she knew of noth- 
ing more that was needed. Perhaps only 
little Unity clearly felt that anything was 
missing, and she did not understand what or 
why. John, the eldest son, had gradually 
taken the management of the farm more 
upon himself, until for the last two or three 
years, since he had reached manhood, it had 
been almost entirely under his control. 
From that time, indeed, it had been slow- 
ly improving. A quiet, methodical, plodding 
fellow was John, with no flights of fancy, no 
taste for the books his father so loved, but 
steady, industrious and economical. The lat- 
ter trait was perhaps developing unduly. It 
might have been his father’s carelessness and 
unthrift in some ways that had driven 
him to the opposite extreme, but people 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 45 

already began to speak of him as “ shrewd 
at a bargain ’’ and “ close/’ He was exceed- 
ingly cautious in his expenditures, and cared 
very little for dress or for the amusements 
of young men ; but then he scarcely seemed 
a young man. Unity considered him almost 
as old as her father, and felt even less ac- 
quainted with him. 

Warren and Reub were younger — boys of 
fifteen and thirteen, nearer to each other in 
age, and also in tastes and companionship, 
than any other two of the family. Their 
chief pursuit, as John viewed it, was to shirk 
as much work as possible, and John’s, from 
their point of observation, was to exact all 
that they could be made to do. Still, as 
John was slow of temper and of tongue, 
persistent rather than authoritative, there 
was little open clashing. The younger 
brothers grumbled and evaded, but seldom 
positively rebelled. 

Unity was accustomed to it all. That 
John should want one thing and Warren 
and Keub another; that her father should 
be calmly oblivious of the rights or wrongs 
of either party unless directly and most 


46 


UNITY DODGE. 


perseveringly appealed to ; that Lucretia 
should churn, bake and sing undisturbed by 
any of the jarring elements ; and that she 
should herself hover along on the borders 
of this daily life without really seeming to 
belong to it or to be much needed or noticed 
by any one as a part of it, — all appeared to 
the child natural by its familiarity. She 
was therefore astonished when Lucretia, 
moved by some unwonted reflections upon 
the day’s doings, suddenly announced at the 
tea-table : 

“Dr. Dodge, I think it’s high time Unity 
was sent to school somewheres.” 

“I have no objection,” answered the doc- 
tor, absently — “ no objection, Lucretia.” 

“ Well, but there’s got to be something 
more done about it than not objecting, if she 
is ever a-goin’,” proceeded Lucretia, a trifle 
impatiently. “ I don’t know as anybody’s 
objected this long time, but she’s never been 
to school a day yet ; and she’s eight years 
old, and goin’ on nine.” 

The last clause was added with an emphasis 
that seemed to say such “goin’ on” had been 
entirely unexpected. It made Unity feel, in 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 


47 


the midst of her surprise, very old, and 
somewhat guilty therefor. 

It also aroused the doctor : 

“ Well, I — Eh, Lucretia ? I didn’t 
quite catch what you were saying. Some- 
thing about a school?” 

‘‘ I said Unity Dodge ought to be a-goin’ 
to school by this time.” 

The doctor glanced at his small daughter, 
glanced at the clock and then at the boys, 
and looked thoroughly bewildered. If it 
were school-time for her, why not for them ? 
Did schools begin later now ? or was it some 
new kind of school? And what had he to 
do with their not being on their way in 
proper time ? 

No one of these questions had he oppor- 
tunity to ask, for Lucretia saw and fore- 
stalled them with the sharpness that she 
occasionally allowed herself as a prerogative 
of her relationship : 

‘‘ No, I don’t s’pose you’ve thought any- 
thing about it. Dr. Dodge. I don’t know 
as anybody ever would think anything 
about it if I didn’t speak, and that’s what 
I’m sayin’. Here’s Unity eight years old 


48 


UNITY DODGE. 


now and never been to school in all her 
life/^ 

“ Hasn^t she ? Eight years ! I’d no idea 
she was so old — though the time seems long 
enough in some ways, too and the doctor 
sighed. Well, fix her up and let her go 
to school with the boys, Lucretia. What’s 
to hinder ?” 

Reub looked particularly dissatisfied. 

‘‘It’ll be no end of bother to have her 
always tagging along and to have to take 
care of her,” he muttered. “We can’t 
have a bit of fun with the boys, and we’ll 
have to start the week beforehand to get 
there in time.” 

That, however, was not exactly a reason 
to be urged to his father, and he bethought 
him of a better one. 

“ I think there’ll be a good deal to hin- 
der,” he said. “ It’s a pretty long walk to 
the Centre school, and she can’t go half 
the time in winter, on account of the snow 
and the roads, nor in summer when it rains ; 
and she can’t go all alone. She wouldn’t 
be in the same room with us, either, and 
all the baby classes are out earlier than 


TIMES AND HALF TIMES. 


49 


ours ; so she’ll have to stay ’round and 
wait.” 

“ The country school at the Forks is 
nearer — not more than half so far,” ob- 
served John, slowly. It isn’t much of 
a school, unless it has improved since I was 
a youngster; but I suppose it might do to 
begin with.” 

I don’t care what one, so it’s a school,” 
declared Lucretia, with a liberalism equaled 
only by that of those who in the same way 
settle questions concerning an eternal future. 

The doctor looked relieved, and the matter 
was decided. 

Lucretia had taught the child the alphabet 
and to read in short words in the same way 
that she had taught her to ‘‘ sew patchwork ” 
and to “say her prayers;” and now she had a 
comfortable conviction that her whole educa- 
tional duty was accomplished. 

But Unity was overwhelmed with dismay. 
She was sensitive and sore from her recent 
unsuccessful plunge into society. She had 
no desire to repeat the experiment, and to be 
thrust quite out into the world in this way 
was dreadful. 


4 


50 


UNITY DODGE. 


Oh, Lucretia, why did you say anything 
about it ?” she cried. 

‘‘ Well, child, you didn’t expect you could 
spend your whole life sitting on a wood-pile 
and thinking of nothing in particular, did 
you ?” retorted Lucretia, contemptuously. 
“ Learnin’ is a good thing ; I’ll say that, if 
I hain’t got much of it myself. Besides, it 
don’t stand to decency for Dr. Dodge to let 
his daughter grow up like a heathen. — He’ll 
come near enough to it, any way, if he’s let 
alone. I’ll warrant,” she added, in an under- 
tone. — ‘‘ Pshaw, child ! you’ll like it well 
enough after a little while. It’s better for 
you.” 

She was right. It checked in a measure 
the broodings and introspection that were 
making the little girl morbid and unchild- 
like, and forced her into new companionship. 
It was the beginning of a more healthful 
life. 


CHAPTEE III. 


JOHN’S WIFE. 

L UCKETIA had been unusually busy for 
weeks. She bad taken an unwonted 
time for house-cleaning — an extra house- 
cleaning between the spring and fall. That 
accomplished, she began to overlook and re- 
model her wardrobe in vigorous fashion, and 
one day brought from the attic an old trunk 
in which to place some of her clothing. 

‘‘ Why don’t you keep them where you 
always have?” questioned Unity, wonder- 
ingly. ‘‘What do you want to put them 
in that for?” 

“ So they’ll be ready to send off,” answered 
Lucretia, crisply. “ I’m going away.” 

The brown eyes opened wider. Unity 
would as soon have expected the roof or 
the foundation of the house to go away ; in- 
deed, it seemed not unlike the latter, to think 
of Lucretia going. 


51 


52 


UNITY DODGE, 


“ Why, Lu — ere — tia Gill !” she exclaimed 
as soon as she could find breath. ‘‘Away ? 
Where r 

“ West, to some of my kin. Tve got 
places enough, only my plans aren^t right- 
ly laid yet.’’ 

“And what will we do ?” 

“ I don’t know.” Lucretia pursed her lips, 
possibly to hide a momentary quivering. 
“ There’s some of you thinks they can get 
along well enough. John does.” 

That name only added to Unity’s bewil- 
derment by suggesting a new reason for 
remaining: 

“Well, I shouldn’t think you’d want to 
go now, when John’s just had the house 
all painted.” 

Lucretia smiled at that. 

“I don’t s’pose he’d have taken the trouble 
to paint it if he’d thought I was a-going to 
stay,” she said — “ I mean, if he’d thought I 
was going to stay the same way I have been. 
I’m bound to say he asked me not to go.” 

“And who will take care of us ?” pursued 
Unity, not in the least enlightened. 

“ Why, your new sister, I s’pose, if any- 


JOHN’S WIFE. 


53 


body does. Child, you ain^t as wise as some 
of your years, or you’d have seen the drift 
of things. John’s going to be married.” 

“ My new sister !” Unity slowly repeated 
the words. 

“ Of course ! John’s wife will be your 
sister, won’t she?” 

John’s havings or doings seldom appealed 
to Unity as anything that concerned or in- 
terested her, though she had been surprised 
and delighted by the recent improvements 
in the place. John’s wife might have been 
viewed with indifference, but a new sister for 
herself ! That was quite another aspect of 
the case. With a quick throb of joy, she 
repeated the words softly under her breath. 
A new sister all her own — an older sister 
such as other girls had ! It was too blissful 
to be true. The color came to her cheeks 
and her eyes sparkled. 

‘‘Are you in really, truly earnest?” she 
demanded, eagerly. 

“ John thinks he is, and that is more to 
the purpose,” replied Lucretia. 

In the two or three years of her school- 
life Unity had learned many things not 


54 


UNITY BODGE. 


marked in the curriculum, and among them 
more clearly to comprehend some of the 
ways in which her home was unlike other 
homes. She had envied some of her school- 
mates the elder sisters who helped them in 
their studies, their plans and their amuse- 
ments, but the possibility of such a possession 
for herself had never before occurred to her. 
A host of happy visions arose with the 
thought, but in the midst of them she 
remembered what Lucretia had said of her 
departure. 

“ But I don’t want you to go away, Lucre- 
tia,” she urged, wonderingly. ‘‘ Why, it’s 
your home here, isn’t it ? And when you’ve 
always lived here, I don’t see why you want 
to go away now, when everything will be so 
nice.” 

‘‘ Maybe it will, and then maybe it won’t.” 
Lucretia paused abruptly. Whatever wisdom 
she lacked, she was at least able to discern 
the folly and selfishness of any attempt to 
prejudice the child against the new comer. 
“ John said he wanted me to stay right 
along; but when anybody’s been first so 
long, they can’t be comfort’ble to have some- 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


55 


body else set over ’em and take the reins 
right out of their hands. ’Twould seem 
queer to have a stranger tellin’ me when to 
use the preserves I put up myself, and how 
to do the work in this house, where I’ve 
done it my own way these ten years. I 
couldn’t noways stay.” 

If Lucretia understood little of child- 
nature in general, and less of this child’s in 
particular, if she had crossed and hurt and 
made the young life barren and hard in 
countless ways, she had yet meant to be 
kind, and much of real kindness and care 
she had given. It was the only substitute 
for mother-love Unity had known, and the 
brown eyes filled with tears. 

“ There, child ! you needn’t fret,” Lucretia 
interposed, hastily. Nobody sends me oflP. 
I want to go for a spell, and I can come 
back again if I don’t like it.” 

The few days of waiting that followed 
were for the little girl full of pleasant ex- 
pectancy and wonderful dreams. She lost 
sight of all probabilities concerning John’s 
wife, and imagined all delightful impossi- 
bilities concerning her new sister — what she 


56 


UNITY DODGE. 


would be and do and the marvelous changes 
that would be wrought. Sober John would 
have smiled had he known her fancies, but 
she asked him no questions. 

Unity never thought of questioning John 
about anything. She persuaded Lucretia 
to substitute fresh muslin curtains for the 
green paper ones in the room arranged for 
the new comer. Curtains of any sort were 
an innovation in the farmhouse. In earlier 
days, when Dr. Dodge had paid some heed 
to domestic affairs, window-hangings were 
among the articles he derided as nonsen- 
sical, not being “ able to discover why any- 
body should make windows for the express 
purpose of letting light into the house, and 
then hang something over them to keep it 
out.’’ Lucretia had gratified her taste by 
introducing a few gay paper shades into 
what she considered her own particular do- 
main, but many of the windows still kept 
their primitive unsoftened barrenness, and 
these added to the dreary, unhomelike look 
of the plainly-furnished rooms by their un- 
blinking glare. 

Unity had given various little touches of 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


57 


her own to that one apartment, and on the 
last morning searched garden and grove for 
a few late autumn flowers for its adorning. 

Lucretia bestowed a dubious glance upon 
the treasures thus carefully gathered. 

If there was any roses or lay locks, ’twould 
seem worth while, but ’tain’t likely anybody’ll 
care for them berries and vines, and such 
truck,” she remarked. 

Unity hesitated. There were people who 
did care for them, she knew. She had seen 
them in other homes, and she saw beauty in 
them. Perhaps her new sister would think 
as she did. 

“ Sisters ’most always do think alike,” she 
whispered to herself, wdth a happy little thrill 
at her heart, as she arranged the trailing vines 
and scarlet berries in the old vase — the only 
one the house afforded. 

There, now !” said Lucretia, when the 
early dinner had been hurried out of the 
way and the kitchen put into its neatest 
order. “ Everything is as ready as it can 
be. The house is spick and span all over ; 
I’ve rubbed up the tins till you can see your 
face in ’em ; there’s plenty of fresh bread in 


58 


UNITY DODGE. 


the pantry; there^s pumpkin-pies and apple- 
pies and crullers that’s good enough for the 
king, if I do say it myself. I don’t see 
what more anybody could want.” 

Unity’s willing little hands had contributed 
their share toward this high state of readiness, 
growing stiff and rough through much egg- 
beating and dish-washing. They trembled 
with nervous haste that afternoon as she 
donned a clean dress and brushed her 
brown hair with painstaking care, even 
though there remained two or three hours 
of waiting before the expected arrival. She 
considered it exceedingly fortunate that a 
school vacation had occurred at so auspi- 
cious a period. Still, that long afternoon 
dragged heavily. She could not resort to 
any of her usual employments lest she 
should in some way disarrange her attire 
or the house. Even Lucretia ventured 
upon nothing more commonplace than 
knitting as she sat stiffly, in the stiffest 
of starched calicoes, in the creaking wooden 
rocking-chair. 

With no other occupation than dreaming. 
Unity’s imagination ran wild. 


JOHN’S WIFE. 


59 


“I wonder whether — Maybe she plays 
the piano and sings/’ she exclaimed, with a 
sudden ecstatic thought. 

‘‘ Well, seein’ John Dodge is John Dodge, 
it ain’t likely he’s married a serypheme nor 
any other kind of an angel,” replied Lu- 
cretia, a trifle vexed by such extravagant 
anticipations. “And I’m free to say she 
hain’t,” she added, ambiguously and under 
her breath. 

“ I wish,” she remarked, presently, “ that 
a body could coax Dr. Dodge to flx up a 
little and put on his coat at supper-time 
’stead of coming down in that old dressin’- 
gown that looks as if it had been used for 
a pen-wiper for ginerations. I don’t s’pose 
I can do it, though ; and if I can’t, why 
she’ll just have to commence as she’s likely 
to go on, that’s all.” The emphasis on the 
last personal pronoun rendered the mean- 
ing of the concluding sentence more ap- 
parent. 

In truth. Dr. Dodge was bestowing very 
little thought upon his prospective daughter- 
in-law, though he had been somewhat startled 
when first the tidings concerning her intro- 


60 


UNITY DODGE. 


ductiou into the household had been made 
known to him. 

“ It’s my opinion, John,” he said, when 
his son had succeeded in drawing his atten- 
tion to the communication he wished to 
make — my opinion from careful study — 
that the time for marrying and giving in 
marriage in this world is nearly past.” 

But it’s been your opinion that the time 
for farming and all that sort of thing was 
over too, father; and we should all have 
been pretty badly oflP if I had been of 
your mind,” urged practical John. 

‘‘As nearly as I can judge from the signs 
of the times and a most careful calculation 
of the prophecies,” pursued the doctor, 
ignoring or not hearing this reply, “this 
world will last but little longer than the 
present generation.” 

“Oh, well, I don’t expect to outlast the 
present generation myself,” said John. “ I 
suppose few people who are of it do, but 
that doesn’t seem to prevent their trying 
to do the best they can for themselves 
while they are here.” 

Dr. Dodge looked at his son meditatively. 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


61 


and then suddenly aroused to a consciousness 
that his own words might be understood as 
uttered in opposition to the project. 

‘‘ I’m not objecting, John. I was a little 
surprised at first. Though I don’t know” 
why I should have been,” he continued, re- 
flectively. “ My mind has been so occupied 
lately ! But I have no objection to ofier. 
You have managed the farm, as you say, 
and it is only fair that you should do it 
in your own way. Do as you think best, 
John.” 

Once brought to a consideration of the 
subject, he was willing to discuss it at 
length and settle upon the terms under 
which John should retain control of the 
place until the younger children should be 
of age, and what share of the property 
should eventually be theirs and his. He 
drew a sigh of relief when the agreement 
was completed and the papers duly signed : 

‘‘I am glad it’s done. I have thought 
sometimes that I ought to attend to it and 
arrange something of the sort. I’m glad 
it is off my mind now. Campbell did you 
say the young lady’s name is?” 


62 


VNITY DODGE. 


Temple, sir — Rhoda Temple.’’ 

‘‘ Oh ! Well, 1 hope you’ll be happy, John, 
for the little time there is remaining — less 
than half a century now, unless my calcu- 
lations are strangely at fault and he went 
back to his study again, and would soon 
have forgotten the expected change in the 
family had it not been occasionally recalled 
to his mind by others. 

Whatever views Warren and E-eub held 
upon the subject they confided solely to 
each other. The only feeling they manifested 
was curiosity, and afterward, as the time drew 
near, embarrassment and annoyance at the 
prospect of a stranger’s presence. Visitors 
were almost unknown in their household 
history, and the imposing air of preparation 
which the whole house wore, together with 
Lucretia’s avowed purpose of having the 
first supper in the room adjoining the kitchen, 
awed and abashed them as something exceed- 
ingly formal and ceremonious. 

Reub murmured discontentedly : 

“ I don’t know how to stand so much fuss. 
Just give me my supper in the kitchen, 
won’t you, Lucretia ?” 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


63 


“No, I won’t,’’ responded Lucretia, prompt- 
ly. “ You’ll just have to brush up for once 
and come into the room like civilized folks, 
or not a bite of supper will you get any- 
where. You don’t s’pose your new sister’ll 
want to eat you, do you ?” 

“ She ain’t my new sister : she’s only 
John’s wife,” muttered Reub. “And I want 
to eat my supper in peace without any 
dressed-up fine ladies.” 

Nevertheless, the mingling of threat and 
exhortation, seconded by Warren’s example, 
had so much effect that when the important 
afternoon arrived Reub came home an hour 
earlier than usual ; and when a rattle of 
wheels at last announced the carriage, he 
was observed, wearing his best jacket and 
with his hair brushed to an extraordinary 
degree of smoothness, suddenly to dodge 
around a corner. 

Even Unity, with all her eagerness, shrank 
back timidly when Warren had taken the 
horses and when John, with a brown-veiled 
figure beside him, stood on the steps. She 
heard Lucretia greet the stranger as “ Mis’ 
Dodge,” and for an instant wondered at the 


64 


UNITY DODGE. 


name. There was a brief exchange of 
remarks upon the roughness of the roads 
and the chilliness of the autumn evening, 
a little rustle and bustle, and then they 
stood by the hearthstone ; and the veil was 
thrown aside in the light of the open fire — 
the one cheerful appointment of the room. 

‘‘ This here is Unity, Mis’ Dodge,” ex- 
plained Lucretia as she took bonnet and 
wraps. 

“My sister, Rhoda,” John added to the 
introduction, looking back over his shoulder 
from giving directions to Warren. 

Unity’s trembling little hand met a gloved 
one for a moment ; she was hurriedly kissed 
in the midst of the unwrapping, and slipped 
shyly back to her former post of observation. 
She had meant to whisper, as her very first 
greeting, how glad she was to have a sister, 
but it did not seem quite the right thing to 
say, after all, and she was silent. 

“ Now I’ll hurry round and get supper 
right away, for you must be ’most starved 
and tired out with your long ride,” remarked 
Lucretia, swiftly deciding upon the easiest 
way of filling the first awkward half hour. 


JOHN'S WIFE. 


65 


“ Oh, you needn’t hurry on my account,” 
answered Mrs. John, in a clear, quick, rather 
highly-pitched voice. “ I’m not one of the 
kind that tires out so easily and with a 
short, satisfied laugh she settled herself in 
the creaking old rocking-chair. ‘‘ This fire 
feels comfortable, though,” she added, hold- 
ing out her hands to its warmth. 

‘‘ Cold coming over the hill ?” questioned 
Lucretia. 

“ Pretty chilly — yes.” 

Then the door closed upon Lucretia, and 
the old clock in the corner ticked slowly, 
deliberately and with embarrassing distinct- 
ness, while Unity pondered whether she 
ought to speak and what she should say. 
Meanwhile, she furtively watched the face 
opposite her — a brown, healthful, not un- 
handsome face with rosy cheeks and keen 
black eyes that seemed to see everything 
at a glance. 

Presently the eyes turned full upon the 
little girl : 

‘‘ So you are Unity ?” 

‘‘ Yes, ma’am.” 

‘‘And the two boys are older ? That was 

5 


66 


UNITY DODGE. 


Warren, I suppose, that came out to the 
wagon 

“ Yes, ma’am.’’ 

“ I don’t believe I spoke to him. And 
Reuben ? Where is he ?” 

‘‘ I guess — he ran away somewhere,” ex- 
plained Unity, hesitatingly. 

Scared, I’ll warrant. Just like a boy !” 
Mrs. John laughed again. ‘‘And then there’s 
your father; and that’s all the family,” she 
added, reflectively, as if to herself. “ What 
room is this ?” she suddenly questioned. 

“The dining-room; only we don’t hardly 
ever eat here,” answered Unity, honestly. 

“ No, I suppose not ; it makes too much 
fuss.” The black eyes scanned the dimen- 
sions of the apartment. “And where do all 
those doors go? No matter, though; I’d 
like to look round a bit as soon as I get 
warm.” 

“ Have you any little sisters at home ?” 
Unity ventured to ask when a moment’s 
silence had fallen. 

“ Oh yes ; there are Sis and Dely. The 
boys, too. The house always had children 
enough.” 


JOHN’S WIFE. 


67 


Won’t you be lonesome without them ?” 
questioned the little girl, sympathizingly. 

“ Oh, I guess not. It’s only twenty miles, 
and I can go back now and then. Besides, 
I’m not one of the fretting kind, specially 
after a houseful of children.” She laughed 
a little. “I think folks ought to do what 
they think is the best thing, and then not 
fret about it.” 

‘‘ Yes,” admitted Unity, slowly. Such 
wisdom seemed so very far beyond her ! 

Lucretia re-entered and began to spread 
the table, affording Unity the relief of as- 
sisting her, and took upon herself the bur- 
den of sociability by such inquiries as she 
could think of concerning Mrs. John’s 
native place and the grain and fruit crop 
in that locality. Dr. Dodge did not appear, 
though he had been privately notified of the 
arrival. John, after his three days’ absence, 
found a variety of matters to look after in 
the barn and yard, and neither Warren nor 
Eeub could have been induced to present him- 
self until the last possible moment. 

So the conversation in the dining-room 
dragged somewhat heavily until Lucretia, 


68 


UNITY DODGE. 


in placing some of the dishes upon the 
table, mentioned the plums she had pre- 
served. Then an enumeration of stores 
began, passing from cans of fruit and jars 
of pickles to the contents of the linen-closet. 
Inquiries and explanations became animated, 
and the subject lasted until supper was 
announced by Lucretia’s loud call from 
the kitchen door. 

Dr. Dodge had donned his coat — “ Because 
I put it right where he couldn’t very well 
get down stairs without stumbling over it,” 
Lucretia accounted for it, in an aside — and 
he greeted his new daughter-in-law very 
kindly : 

“ I hope you will be happy here, and you 
must at once make yourself at home in your 
own way. I am very busy myself and not 
about the house much, but you will not 
miss that.” 

The boys were rather bashful and awk- 
ward, and Beub was somewhat gruff in his 
efforts to hide all discomfort under an air 
of unconcern. 

The brief introductions over, they hur- 
ried to the table. It was a plentiful repast. 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


69 


well cooked and well served, but a some- 
what constrained and silent party gathered 
around it, nevertheless. Indeed, the meals 
at the farmhouse were usually silent. John 
never talked much, nor did the doctor, of 
late years, except when launched upon his 
favorite topic. But probably none of the 
family had realized the dearth of conver- 
sation until the presence of this stranger 
made it painfully noticeable. She might 
have been pardoned if, under all the cir- 
cumstances, she had felt drearily homesick 
that evening. 

Unity, without fully understanding her 
own thought, wondered if she did. While 
her father read in his slow, sonorous voice 
of the vials of wrath and the battle-plains 
of Armageddon, the child furtively watched 
her new sister’s face to see if she too shrank 
from the coming terrors, and from her fa- 
ther’s interpolated prophecies, and from the 
prayer — if that could be called a prayer 
which partook so largely of an attempt to 
explain to God his own mysteries — which 
followed. 

Family worship was a curious institution 


70 


UNITY DODGE. 


in that household. John usually went 
about his work in the morning without 
waiting for it, and in the evening he 
drowsed through it. It was an old habit 
of his father’s — a part of the familiar rou- 
tine. It did not occur to him to question its 
reason, its use or its abuse; he was simply 
accustomed to it : that was all. Warren 
and Beub absented themselves as much as 
possible, which was frequently enough, for 
the doctor often failed to notice whether or 
not the family were all present. Once a 
teacher in the Sunday-school — the young 
Dodges rarely attended — had been urging 
the value of sacred music, and asked Beu- 
ben if he did not think it would be pleas- 
ant, when a chapter was read in family wor- 
ship at home, to sing an appropriate hymn. 
The boy replied that he “didn’t know of 
any that would suit their chapters unless it 
were ‘Day of Wrath’ or ‘Hark from the 
Tombs,’ ” thereby drawing upon himself a 
reproof for irreverence. But he had spoken 
the simple truth. Week after week, month 
after month. Dr. Dodge read and prayed 
with no regard to life’s daily varying needs. 


JOHN^S WIFE, 


71 


but with vision fixed on far-away momentous 
events. The older children paid little heed 
to any of it, and Unity’s dread had been 
greatly dulled by familiarity. She only 
shivered a little now and then when her 
wandering thoughts — she was glad to have 
them wander — were recalled by the words, 
and she drew a long breath of relief when 
the exercise ended and she could escape 
from the room and shake off the thought 
of it, as some ghostly presence, in the sun- 
shine of the outer world. On this partic- 
ular evening she wondered whether the 
new comer had any such feeling about it, 
and when she should be well enough ac- 
quainted to dare to ask her or to talk with 
her about such things. The comfortable, 
rosy face betrayed no trouble. In truth, 
Mrs. John had long before had information, 
considerably exaggerated, concerning Dr. 
Dodge and his eccentricities, and while he 
read she was mentally calculating how 
many yards of carpeting that room re- 
quired. 

The two boys slipped away the moment 
the “Amen ” was uttered. John went out 


72 


UNITY DODGE. 


for a final inspection of the stable to assure 
himself that all was safe for the night; 
Lucretia departed, on a similar errand, to 
the kitchen; and then Unity, finding her- 
self once more alone with the object of her 
many dreams, ventured to slip to her side, 
steal an arm shyly around her neck and 
whisper, 

‘‘You are my sister now, ain’t you? I 
guess we’ll soon learn to love each other, 
won’t we?” 

“ Why, what a start you gave me. Sis !” 
Mrs. John laughed. “ I didn’t hear you 
coming. Why, of course I’m your sister — 
or sister-in-law: it ain’t quite the same thing. 
Yes, I expect we’ll get along first rate to- 
gether. I’m no great hand to make a fuss 
over anybody ; it isn’t my way, and I don’t 
think it amounts to much, anyhow. But 
I’ve no fears about our getting along all 
right. Suppose you show me round the 
house a little more while we are waiting 
for the folks to come in.” 

Unity’s arm had dropped from its momen- 
tary resting-place. She gravely took a lamp 
and led the way. 


JOHN^S WIFE, 


73 


“When is that — Lucretia do you call 
her?” 

“ Lucretia Gill.” 

“ Yes. — When is she going away ?” 

“ To-morrow noon,” answered Unity, a 
choking lump rising in her throat as she 
suddenly realized, more clearly than ever 
before, what Lucretia’s going meant to her. 

“ Oh !” responded Mrs. John, cheerfully. 

Then John’s voice was heard calling 
“ Rhoda !” and they separated for the night. 

Unity did not know why her pillow grew 
wet with hot tears, or why she wished — 
there seemed no reason for that, whatever — 
that she had not placed the vase of tangled 
vines and bright berries in her sister-in- 
law’s room. 

Lucretia, passing through to her own apart- 
ment, stopped by the child’s bedside, lamp 
in hand, and looked suspiciously down upon 
the flushed cheeks. 

“ What’s the matter ?” she asked, shortly, 

“ Nothing. I don’t know,” answered the 
little girl, truly enough. 

“Well, see here,” said Lucretia, with a 
sudden incisive wisdom which her remarks 


74 


UNITY DODGE. 


did not usually possess : ‘‘ the trouble with 
you is that you want to make the world and 
everybody in it to suit your own plan, and 
you can’t do it. Things was mostly made 
before you came, and you’ll have to learn to 
take ’em as you find ’em, child.” 

The next morning there was a thorough 
review of cellar and stores, an explanation 
of the contents of bottles and boxes; and 
then, having fully initiated her successor, 
Lucretia completed her packing. The light 
wagon was waiting to convey herself and 
her trunk to the railway-station, but she 
lingered long enough at the old red gate, 
after all other farewells were said, to turn 
and clasp Unity in a sudden bear-like hug, 
and to whisper, with a demonstrativeness the 
child had never witnessed before, 

‘‘ I do b’lieve I love you better’n any other 
living creature. Unity Dodge ; and if you’re 
ever in need of anything I can do, let me 
know it.” 

Then she pulled down her green veil 
and was off before Unity fairly recovered 
from her surprise. 

Indoors, Mrs. John surveyed her new 


JOHN^S WIFE. 


75 


realm and hummed a gay snatch of song 
that seemed to indicate no melancholy at 
being left in undisputed possession of it, 
while she went over it once more alone. 
Out of doors, Unity watched the wagon 
until it was out of sight, and then went to 
the wood-pile — less sought since her school- 
days began — to meditate. 


CHAPTER lY. 


“jwr house:* 

A WEEK later two large boxes arrived, 
and Mrs. John rubbed her hands glee- 
fully when she saw them. 

“ Good ! Now we can begin to fix up,’’ 
she said to Unity. 

“ What is in them?” asked Unity, bright- 
ening in sympathy and with all a child’s 
interest in hidden treasures. 

“ Some things of mine that the folks have 
sent on ; I had them nearly all packed before 
I came away. Wait a little, till the morning 
work is out of the way, and you’ll see.” 

It was no long waiting. Mistress Hhoda 
moved about in a brisk, energetic way ; strong- 
handed, quick-sighted, she made every mo- 
tion count and never took two steps for 
what could be accomplished in one. She 
could ‘‘turn off work as fast as the next 
one,” she was wont to declare, with a little 

76 


MY house: 


77 


satisfied nod of her head ; and the boast 
was not an empty one. 

John watched her with a pleased, satisfied 
air as she fiew about the old farmhouse in 
her vigorous fashion ; and if the sense of 
pride and pleasure was nearly identical with 
that awakened by his beautiful chestnut colt 
in the pasture — a feeling of having ‘‘ made 
a good bargain,” a scarcely conscious calcula- 
tion of money value — she did not know it, 
nor was he aware of it. 

“ ‘ When the pie was opened, 

The birds began to sing,’ ” 


laughed Unity as soon as the box-covers 
were knocked off and she got a glimpse 
of the assorted contents. “ Oh, Rhoda, 
what lots of things!” 

Yes, but there are a good many dishes, 
and they take up so much of the space. I 
wish I had more furniture for the house ; it 
needs it badly enough,” answered Rhoda, 
reflectively, with an unspoken thought of the 
proceeds of future butter and eggs. ‘‘ Well, 
now we’ll see what we can do for this 


room. 


78 


UNITY DODGE. 


It was the parlor, or sitting-room : “ the 
room ’’ Lucretia had always emphatically 
called it, in Western fashion. The shining 
cleanliness in which she had left it forestalled 
all labor in that direction, and its new mis- 
tress had only to arrange and alter as suited 
her. She introduced a new rocking-chair — 
not very comfortable, but in a high state of 
varnish and gay upholstery — and appointed 
it to a conspicuous place, while the old one 
was pushed farther back in a corner, a 
cushion manufactured for it and its back 
adorned with a tidy. A small table, a 
bright cover and two or three gilded books 
to lay upon it formed the next addition. 
After that the boxes furnished only small 
articles, but Unity watched and aided in 
their unpacking and arrangement with keen 
delight. Fringed and tasseled curtains were 
hung at the windows, and half a dozen 
pictures on the walls. A row of photo- 
graphs, alternating with shells and little 
china mugs and vases, decorated the high 
mantel-piece, and tidies of all shapes and 
sizes were pinned and spread with a lavish 
hand. If these last presented only variety 


HOUSEr 79 

instead of harmony of coloring; if the cheap 
prints on the walls were of a kind to have 
driven an artist wild ; if the vases and mugs 
were neither old enough nor ugly enough to 
have gratified aesthetic taste and were value- 
less because they bore no hieroglyphics, but 
only such plain and flattering inscriptions as 
“ To a Good Boy if the curtains were in 
no wise suited to the windows, — neither 
Unity nor Mrs. Bhoda knew it, and their 
complacency in their work was undisturbed. 

Many times Unity paused in the doorway 
to survey the effect as the process of remodel- 
ing went on, and her brown eyes sparkled 
when at last it was completed. 

‘‘ It looks like another room,” pronounced 
Bhoda, well satisfied. 

I should think it did !” agreed Unity, 
enthusiastically. Isn’t it pretty now ? 
Oh, Bhoda, won’t it look nice when there 
is a fire here?” 

“ Yes, I expect so ; but we sha’n’t have it 
that way very often.” 

Why, in the evenings, you know,” ex- 
plained Unity. ‘‘ It’ll soon be winter, and it’s 
too cold now to sit here without any fire.” 


80 


UNITY DODGE. 


Dear me, child ! you don’t suppose I 
mean to have all our own folks coming in 
here every day and using all these things for 
common ? It would be all mussed up in no 
time. I want some place kept decent for 
company.” 

An ambitious plan that had been slowly 
growing in the little girl’s brain — of bring- 
ing home some of her schoolmates to see 
Rhoda and proudly showing them into this 
room, “ as nice as anybody’s ” — suddenly 
faded ; but she said nothing. 

Reub, coming home, stopped at the open 
door and stared in round-eyed wonder at the 
transformation. He whistled, and then his 
freckled face brightened. 

‘‘ What do you think of it ?” questioned 
Mrs. John. 

“ Stu — pen — jous !” replied Reub, search- 
ing for a word dignified enough for the 
occasion. “ I say, won’t this be a jolly place 
to sit in evenings and read by the firelight ?” 

‘‘ Only the firelight won’t be here and 
you will have to do your reading somewhere 
else,” laughed his sister-in-law. “ You’re as 
bad as Unity. As if I’d go to work and 


MY house: 


81 


fix up the room this way to have it all littered 
up every night !” and she composedly pro- 
ceeded to darken the windows and close 
the doors. 

Hu — h !” muttered Reub, contemptuous- 
ly, as he turned on his heel, all his interest 
banished at once. 

Unity looked from one to the other in si- 
lence. However plain the old room had been 
under Lucretia’s superintendence, it had al- 
ways been free to whoever chose to use it. 
She was not sure that there was very much 
comfort in these darkened and locked-up 
improvements, after all. She wondered 
what her father would say. Not that he 
would be likely to care, or even to notice, 
but for the one fact that it was the room in 
which he was accustomed to hold the family 
worship. 

John also remembered that, and informed 
his wife of it when she led him to inspect 
her work and explained her intention of 
not having it “ used for common any 
longer.” 

‘‘It’s only that father is used to it, you 
see,” he said, doubtfully. “ I don’t know 


82 


UNITY DODGE. 


how he’ll like to change. When he gets 
used to a thing, he always wants to stick 
to it.” 

“ Well, he can get used to something else, 
then, I’m sure. Oh, I’ll manage father easy 
enough. You’ll see. You needn’t worry 
about that. The long and short of it is, 
John, there’s been a good deal of waste in 
this house, and we have got to economize 
if you and I are ever going to get ahead 
and make anything. There’s no sense in 
keeping so many fires, for one thing.” 

“ I suppose that’s so,” admitted John, ad- 
miringly. 

When Dr. Dodge turned toward the 
familiar room that evening, Mrs. John 
looked up and remarked, as if it were the 
most natural of happenings, 

“ Oh, father, there’s no fire in there to- 
night. I’ve been working and fixing up 
to-day, and I didn’t make any. Couldn’t 
we stop here?” 

The doctor paused irresolutely, looking at 
the door and back at his daughter-in-law. 

‘‘ I — we have always been accustomed — ” 
he began, uncertainly; and then, as she has- 


“ 3 /r house: 


83 


teued to place a chair for him by the light 
and brought forward the Bible, he turned 
to the proffered seat and said nothing more. 

John’s chief ascription of praise that 
night was not at all in the line of prayer. 

“ What a hand at managing she is !” he 
repeated more than once, with an inaudible 
chuckle. She certainly managed that mat- 
ter very skillfully. 

When the doctor turned his steps to the 
parlor the next morning, Bhoda had a conve- 
nient errand to the pantry, and so allowed 
him an opportunity to open the door and 
discover for himself that the room was both 
dark and cold. It could not be used in that 
condition. He glanced helplessly toward 
the curtains, and then at the blackened and 
empty grate. It was too dark clearly to 
discover either the nature or the extent of 
the changes ; there was, at the moment, no 
one visible to answer any inquiries, and he 
again sought the corner he had occupied 
the previous evening. Mrs. John’s errand 
detained her until he was fairly seated; 
and when she took her place and the boys 
came in from the barn, he was already in- 


84 


UNITY DODGE. 


tent upon the chapter before him. A few 
repetitions of the experiment, with slight 
variations, established the new order, and 
he ceased to notice it. 

Warren discontentedly viewed the loss 
of the room in which he had most fre- 
quently spent his evenings, and Reub mut- 
tered openly : 

‘‘ I hope she won’t take a notion to fix up 
any more, or we shall be driven out of the 
house.” 

It was a truer prophecy than many of 
his father’s, and of a more nearly impending 
evil, but no one heeded. Mistress Rhoda 
smiled in good-natured serenity, and pretend- 
ed not to hear as she bent over her sewing. 

“I think things must have gone in a 
dreadfully slipshod way while Lucretia was 
here,” she remarked to her husband one 
day. 

“ Oh, I don’t know. Lucretia did pretty 
well,” ventured John, mindful of his own 
ignorance in house-craft, but moved by a 
sense of justice and certain kindly memo- 
ries of the absent. She kept everything 
clean, and she was a good cook — ” 


MY HOUSE” 


86 


‘‘I don’t mean that she wasn’t neat,” inter- 
rupted his wife, “ or that she starved you, 
either: you’d all have found that out soon 
enough,” with a laugh. ‘‘ But things about 
the place haven’t been made the most of. 
The butter and the eggs, now : I’m sure 
they can be made to bring in more than 
they have done. Though, of course, she’d 
no particular interest in things of that sort. 
She couldn’t feel just as if they were her 
own. Well, I’m going to see what I can 
do,” with a nod that expressed unbounded 
faith in her own ability. ‘‘Any way, I mean 
to make the most of everything.” 

But that common phrase means such dif- 
ferent things to different people, and is alto- 
gether so contradictory and impossible a proj- 
ect when one begins seriously to analyze it ! 
Making the most of the best things neces- 
sitates making very little of many other 
things. 

Mrs. John, however, was troubled by no 
complicated meanings. She understood her 
own intentions. 

“ Do you like to go up to the Centre trad- 
ing ?” she asked of Unity one morning. 


86 


VNITY DODQE. 


Yes/’ answered Unity, brightly. It was 
a pleasant day to go anywhere, and she had 
a child’s liking for seeing new things as well 
as for buying them. 

‘‘Well, then, you run out and tell John I 
want one of the horses and the light wagon, 
won’t you ? Or the old chaise, if he thinks 
his father won’t want it. I forgot to say 
anything about it at breakfast. Be quick, 
and then we will go.” 

“ What is it you want to do, Bhoda ?” 
questioned John, coming within hailing- 
distance of the kitchen door when Unity 
had fulfilled her commission. 

“ I want to take some butter and eggs up 
to the Centre.” 

“ Oh, if that’s all. I’ll be going up my- 
self some time this afternoon, and I can 
take them. Lucretia often sent them that 
way.” 

“ Yes, I’ll warrant that was the way it 
was managed,” laughed Khoda. “As if I 
would trust you! That isn’t all, either: I 
want to buy some things with the money I 
get, and you wouldn’t know anything about 
muslins or calicoes, and would be sure to 


MY HOUSE.' 


87 


bring home something I don’t want. What’s 
the matter? Can’t you spare a horse?” 

“Yes, I suppose I might,” admitted John. 
“I’ll bring it round directly;” and he walked 
off congratulating himself : “ She’s the one to 
make things go — the smartest little woman in 
this region.” 

Rhoda’s keen black eyes ran over Unity’s 
attire when she came down, and she quickly 
smoothed out a bow and straightened a fold 
or two. 

“ You’ll do,” she said. 

Rhoda’s taste was undoubtedly an improve- 
ment upon Lucretia’s, but she swiftly as- 
sured herself “ it couldn’t matter really 
about a child’s clothes. No one notices 
them, and, so long as she isn’t old 
enough to know for herself, it does not 
seem worth while to put notions in her 
head that will only cost money.” 

The little girl cast some admiring glances 
upon her sister-in-law as they rode along 
the pleasant country road together. Her 
wardrobe was yet in all its bridal freshness, 
and Unity had a comfortable sense of be- 
ing in some way connected with the pretty 


88 


UNITY DODGE. 


dress and the new hat. What a brisk, 
confident independence there was about all 
Ehoda^s ways and doings! And Unity 
was inclined to give confidence to any one 
who appeared self-confident. 

Very assured and decided was Mrs. John’s 
manner when they reached the store. She 
knew exactly what she wanted and what 
she meant to pay — or, rather, what she 
meant not to pay, which was the price asked. 
But Unity suddenly lost all her interest in 
shopping. Her cheeks burned, though she 
scarcely knew why, while Bhoda tested this 
fabric and picked flaws in that one, insisted 
upon a higher price for the butter and eggs, 
and that the delaines and muslins should be 
sold for a cent or two less per yard ; she had 
bought them so elsewhere. 

Unity walked away to the door. It 
seemed an interminable time before the 
trading was completed, but Khoda came 
forth at last with a satisfied face and with 
her arms filled with bundles. 

“ What was there in the street that you 
wanted to watch so long ?” she asked, when 
they were riding homeward. 


“ i¥F house: 


89 


‘‘ Why, I don’t know. Nothing special.” 
Unity hesitated a little over the answer. “I 
didn’t like to stay in the store.” 

“ I don’t see why,” commented Rhoda, 
rather wonderingly. “ Children generally 
like to look at the goods; Sis and Dely 
always did. Besides, that is the way to 
learn how to trade. I thought there must 
have been something particularly interesting 
or you wouldn’t have stood there looking out 
at the door so long. Well, I made some real 
good bargains, any way.” 

Which statement she repeated to John at 
dinner, relating the morning’s occurrences 
and her own success — what was asked or 
offered for each article, what she said about 
it, and the price finally paid — while he 
listened and laughed ; and even Reub 
seemed to enjoy the recital and declared 
she was ‘‘sharp.” 

“ Yes, I rather think the butter and eggs 
brought in more to-day than they ever did 
before,” assented Rhoda, complacently. “ I 
don’t know how Lucretia managed, to be 
sure, but Unity doesn’t seem to have the 
least idea of such things. I’m afraid it 


90 


UNITY DODGE. 


wouldn’t do to send her alone, as we used 
sometimes to send Sis and Dely at home.” 

Oh, I couldn’t do it at all,” acknowledged 
Unity, shrinking in dismay at the mere men- 
tion of such a commission. 

‘‘ No, I don’t think she’ll ever be equal to 
that sort of thing,” remarked Warren, so 
positively that Unity felt utterly humiliated 
and insignificant. But John cast a quick, 
questioning, scarcely-pleased glance at the 
speaker, as if somewhat doubtful of his 
meaning. 

“ Be sure you are right, and then go 
ahead” is a much-quoted maxim. Bhoda al- 
ways went ahead, and apparently she had 
no misgivings about being right. In a 
short time her ambitious, energetic spirit, 
her busy, thrifty, bustling plans, had per- 
meated all the farmhouse life and became 
manifest in countless ways. Yet, if she 
carried her points persistently, she did it 
for the most part good-naturedly. If she 
hurried others, she hurried herself also. 
She delighted in her own ability to ‘‘ turn 
off work,” as she phrased it, though Beub 
grumblingly averred that he ‘‘ never had 


“iVr house: 


91 


seen any turned off yet: it was all taken 
in/’ She was not consciously selfish in her 
planning. “Whatever helps along the farm, 
and is good for John and me, is good for all, 
of course,” she always reasoned, and so 
settled the matter satisfactorily to herself 
without entering into details which might 
have shown it in a somewhat different light. 
Whatever extra work she could induce the 
boys to do was so much clear gain. Besides, 
it must be good for them. What could be 
more valuable than habits of industry ? 
And what could be better fitted to implant 
industrious habits in a boy than to keep him 
busy as constantly as possible ? Her nature 
was not deep enough for self-distrust. It 
never occurred to her to doubt her own 
judgment or to question the wisdom of 
her own methods. At home she had always 
been taken at her own valuation. Her father 
was wont to remark, with a sagacious nod, 
“ Oh, she’s a smart one ! What Bhody can’t 
do ain’t worth doing and she was of the 
same opinion. With all the many proj- 
ects for her own aggrandizement — hers and 
John’s — which she had brought to her new 


92 


UNITY DODGE. 


home, she yet unmisgivingly believed that 
her coming was a boon and a blessing to 
everybody about the place. 

So, in a thoroughly comfortable frame of 
mind, Rhoda devised and carried out many 
little schemes that were often' aggravatingly 
transparent. When she saw Reub coming 
toward the house, and had reason to suspect 
that he was intent upon fishing-tackle or 
rabbi t-traps, it was easy to hurry the cream 
into the churn, give it a few whisks with 
the dasher and be ready to say^ when he 
arrived, 

‘‘Oh, Reub, take care of this a few 
minutes, won’t you ? I want to go to the 
cellar.” 

Then, even though she busied herself 
with work down stairs until the churning 
was nearly done, Reub could scarcely have 
the ill-grace to leave it until she came ; and 
if afterward he complained, she only laughed : 
the churning done, he might fret if he chose. 

But after being entrapped a few times, 
Reub avoided the house when he heard 
the sound of the dasher. 

“No, sir! She don’t catch me that way 


MY house: 


93 


again,” he muttered, stopping short and 
turning in another direction. ‘‘ If she’d 
just ask me fair and square, so I could have 
a chance to say ‘ Yes ’ or ‘ No,’ I’d do it — 
part of the time, anyhow ; but I won’t be 
wheedled into it any more.” 

When the evenings grew cooler, it fre- 
quently happened that no fire was found in 
any of the lower rooms except the kitchen. 
A large and tidy kitchen it was, but the 
position of table and lamps rendered it not 
altogether pleasant or convenient for the 
multiplicity of employments carried on there. 

‘‘ We all have to crowd around this one 
table, and we can’t half see,” said the boys. 

If you can’t see to read, you might see 
to help wind these carpet-rags,” proposed 
Ehoda, cheerfully. “That’s what John is 
going to do.” 

Another night she had several large 
baskets of apples suggestively at hand. 

“If you boys are going to stay here, 
you might help us pare these apples,” she 
said. 

“ I’m not going to stay here,” answered 
Warren, taking up his hat with a suddenly- 


94 


UNITY DODGE. 


formed determination to spend the evening 
at the Centre. 

I am, but I wanted to read,” replied 
Keub, dolefully. 

‘‘ You see,” he explained to Warren, 
afterward, when a fellow w’ants to do a 
thing, he wants to do it in peace, and not 
have somebody watching him all the time 
and thinking he ought to do something 
else.” 

Rhoda thought books were well enough in 
their place. She had never accurately de- 
termined what their place was, but she had 
a general opinion that they should not 
occupy any hours that could be used for 
work, school-books and school-hours except- 
ed. These last must be duly allowed, of 
course, and should be attended to and done 
up as regularly as the weekly washing. But 
just reading — that was quite a different 
thing. She had wasted very little time in 
that way herself. 

After which, it is scarcely necessary to 
state that Mistress Bhoda’s knowledge of 
books was very limited. She had a certain 
respect for what she called ‘‘ useful reading,” 


MY house: 


95 


using the term vaguely, with a dim idea of 
knowledge and dullness as combined in some 
weighty history or biography. She never 
attempted anything of that kind herself, 
except, perhaps, for a dreary half hour on 
Sunday, but she offset such deficiencies by 
pluming herself upon the virtue of never 
reading trashy novels and tales.” When, 
therefore, she one morning discovered that a 
book inadvertently left upon the table wore 
a paper cover, she lifted it suspiciously. It 
was decorated with a picture of a melancholy 
damsel with clasped hands and flowing hair, 
two Indians in full war-paint and feathers, 
and a ‘‘gallant hunter” just emerging from 
one of those secret caves which in this class 
of literature appear with such obliging fre- 
quency that one might suppose the whole 
country were an immense honeycomb. 

Mistress Rhoda bestowed one glance upon 
this work of art, and immediately deposited 
the volume in the stove. 

“ There ! that’s the end of that,” she said, 
in high disgust. “ I won’t have such trash 
in my house, not if I can help it. So much 
reading is bad enough, any way — doing noth- 


96 


UNITY DODGE. 


ing but read a whole evening ; but if they 
leave such stuff as that around where I can 
get hold of it, it won’t last long.” 

Reub, inquiring for his book a little later, 
was wrathful when he learned its fate. 

‘‘ It wasn’t mine, any way : it was bor- 
rowed,” he declared, indignantly. 

“ Well, it’s no loss to any one,” asserted 
E-hoda, calmly ; ‘‘ and if the owner won’t 
lend you any more, so much the better. 
Such stuff as that ! I should think you’d 
have been ashamed to ask what had become 
of it.” 

Well, I wasn’t ; and you’d no right to 
touch it, either,” said Eeub, with a sufficient 
amount of justice on his side to make him 
feel quite as much abused as ashamed. 

He scolded, and Ehoda laughed. What 
else should she do, since she was secure in 
the fact that all his talking could not restore 
the obnoxious volume? She did not attempt 
to argue with him upon the folly and the 
wrong of such reading. Indeed, she had 
no arguments to advance, but that left her 
perfectly un trammeled in her denunciation. 
It was trash because all such books were 


MY house: 


97 


trash. ‘‘ How did she know ?” Why, be- 
cause she did. “ Had she ever read any ?” 
No, indeed she hadn’t! and she never wanted 
to. It was no use talking ; she considered it 
her duty to burn everything of the kind that 
she found, and she would do it. That was 
the sum and the substance of her answers ; 
and Heub was at last obliged, sullenly 
enough, to abandon the topic and accept 
as best he could the loss of the book. 

E-hoda congratulated herself upon her 
success in the transaction. Her zeal in 
this one direction was intense in propor- 
tion to its narrowness and ignorance. How 
much of it originated in an}" real desire to 
prevent injury and wrong, and how much 
in a mere obstinate pride of carrying out 
her own opinions, she did not inquire. She 
was not accustomed to mental or moral anal- 
ysis, and she believed in nothing so strongly 
as herself. 

‘‘People talk of the evils of such read- 
ing,” she soliloquized. “What do they 
have it for? If they were like me, they 
just wouldn’t have it around — that’s all;” 
and she really felt competent, this half-edu- 

7 


98 


UNITY DODGE. 


cated youug woman of twenty years, to set 
right most of the evils in the universe. 
Did not she and all her father’s house 
know that what Rhoda could not do was 
not worth doing? 

If Reub brought any more books of the 
kind to the kitchen for reading, he did 
not bring them openly and was careful to 
carry them away with him when he left 
the room. 

The occurrence had been nearly forgot- 
ten — by Rhoda, at least — until a few weeks 
later, when, on a sweeping and dusting tour 
through the house, she found in the chamber 
occupied by the boys a number of the same 
paper-covered volumes piled upon a little 
stand. She did not stop to sift the wheat 
from the chaff — there were a few grains of 
wheat — but, without a moment’s hesitation, 
condemned the whole to the fire. 

“ I told Reub what I’d do with every one 
I found, and he may keep them out of the 
way if he don’t want them burned,” she 
said, in answer to Unity’s exclamation of 
dismay. 

But this time it was Warren who de- 


“Mr house: 


99 


manded an account of them, and in his 
dark eyes there was a look that made it 
more difficult to explain to him than it 
had been to brave Keub’s boyish temper. 
Even upon E-hoda’s comprehension it 
dawned that Warren was not a little boy. 
She laughed uneasily, and flushed over her 
recital. 

‘‘Then you mean to say that you went into 
my room, hunted over my books that were 
lying there disturbing no one, and con- 
cluded to burn them 

“ Pshaw ! Such stuff, Warren ! It ought 
to be burned, every bit of it.” 

Warren declined to discuss the value of 
the books, but very decidedly intimated that 
she was carrying her oversight and man- 
agement too far. 

“Well, but it was such trash! Every- 
body calls it trash, and you and Eeub 
oughtn’t to read it,” she began, lamely 
enough; and then, vexed at her own con- 
fusion, she took refuge in deflance: “Be- 
sides, I don’t like it, and I won’t have 
it in my house ; I’ve always said I 
wouldn’t.” 


100 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘And how long have you owned this 
house, Mrs. Dodge Warren asked. 

This hot anger was very different from 
Keub’s outburst of passion, and it did not 
die down so easily. Rhoda secretly wished 
she had not provoked it, and John heartily 
agreed with her before the day was over. 
He found himself in an unpleasant posi- 
tion between his desire to uphold his wife^s 
views and doings and his dread of irritating 
Warren any farther. He would gladly have 
avoided taking any part in the matter, but 
that was impossible. 

“Rhoda meant no harm, Warren,’’ he 
urged, trying to conciliate without aban- 
doning the ground she had taken. “She 
doesn’t believe in that kind of books; she 
has been brought up that way, you see, 
and — ” 

“And she has a right to think exactly 
what she pleases about them,” interrupted 
Warren, sharply. “ But she has no right 
whatever to burn a book, or anything else, 
that doesn’t belong to her. I’ll read when 
and what I like.” 

“ Oh, well — See here, Warren.” John 


MY house: 


101 


shifted his feet uneasily. Nobody is say- 
ing anything against your reading — only 
such stuff, you know. There are plenty of 
good-enough books about the house, if you 
want to read, without bringing in these. 
There’s father’s library — ” 

‘‘Father’s books !” Warren’s sneer was un- 
disguised. “ If my reading isn’t as useful as 
his, I’ll own it’s been pretty poor.” 

“ You know very well what I mean.” 
John made that assertion the more posi- 
tively because he did not himself very 
clearly understand what he did mean. 
“Those stories are all stuff and nonsense. 
Any way, Rhoda doesn’t think they’re 
right, and she doesn’t want them in her 
house.” 

“It isn’t her house, nor yours, either, 
John : you’d best remember that before 
you go too far. And my room especially 
isn’t her house, and I mean to have an end 
of all such meddling there.” 

“ Well, I’ll let it alone after this, but you 
may not find it very comfortable,” said Rhoda, 
with flaming cheeks and snapping eyes. Her 
usual good- nature had vanished. 


102 


UNITY DODGE. 


“ ril risk that. — You know how to make 
a bed and fix the room, don’t you?” He 
turned abruptly to Unity. 

‘‘I? Yes.” The girl hesitated, looking 
from one to the other and uncertain what 
reply she ought to make. 

“ You take care of it, then, won’t you ? 
If the pillows are a little crooked now and 
then, they will do ; and other things will 
not be meddled with, as you happen to be 
a Dodge — and honest.” 

‘‘ Take care, Warren !” exclaimed John. 
‘‘Don’t go too far.” 

“ Take care yourself,” retorted Warren ; 
and for an instant the brothers looked in 
each other’s eyes with a glare not good to 
see. Then Warren turned away with an 
unpleasant laugh and John went out. 
There was nothing more said about it, 
yet a breach had been made that widened 
from that day. 

Very soon it would have seemed to an 
ordinary observer — to one like Dhoda — that 
everything was going on as before. For a 
short time she persisted in her determination 
to have nothing to do with the boys’ room. 


MY HOUSE’ 


103 


but she was too well satisfied with herself 
to be easily offended ; her housewifely tend- 
encies were strong, and she speedily took 
charge of the apartment once more. She 
did not disturb the books, however, even 
when, as rarely happened, she saw them 
lying on the stand, and they were never 
brought down stairs again. The boys read 
in their own room when they read in the 
house at all ; and when the weather grew 
colder and the fireless room was uncom- 
fortable, they dropped into a habit of go- 
ing up to the Centre to spend their even- 
ings. Warren was the first to go, and 
Reub soon accompanied him. 

Of course they were welcome to stay at 
home if they chose, but Rhoda did rather 
enjoy having the kitchen to herself and 
John with no other encumbrance than 
Unity. She sewed and knitted content- 
edly, pleased with her own industry and 
sure that she was fulfilling her woman’s 
mission as well as any one could. When 
she remembered her crusade against per- 
nicious literature, she comforted herself 
with the thought that she had taken such 


104 


UNITY DODGE. 


a stand that at least none of it would ever 
be left lying around the house where it could 
be seen. She had done as well as she could. 

As for Dr. Dodge, he was busy that 
winter trying to locate the plain of Arma- 
geddon: where his boys were located he 
did not know. 


CHAPTEE V. 

TOM’S BOY.” 


D O these chapters appear but a recital of 
trifles ? The days of common lives seem 
made up of such, scarcely worth the telling. 
One week is monotonously like another. 
We sleep and rise, night and day, and mean- 
while the little seeds of good and evil, sown 
with careless or unconscious hand, spring up 
and grow — we know not how until we are 
surprised by the harvest. The days and the 
months come and go, seeming to bring but 
little that is new ; it is only as we look back 
over the years that we see the wonderful 
changes which have been slowly wrought. 

The months at the farmhouse passed un- 
eventfully enough. The different seasons 
brought their differing work: that was all. 
The place was undoubtedly prospering. 
Barns, outbuildings, fences, all told of in- 
creasing care, thrift and order, and the fields 

i05 


106 


UNITY BODGE. 


were yielding as never before. The fresh 
start the old place had taken and the rapid- 
ity with which it was ‘‘building up” were 
subjects of common remark. The neigh- 
bors observed to one another, “What a good 
thing it was that John married as he did, 
settled down there, and took the farm into 
his own hands!” adding occasionally, with 
a shake of the head, “Pity the younger 
boys are not so steady. Rather wild, those 
two; hanging around stores and the bar- 
room up at the Centre House too much for 
any good, they say.” 

“ They say ” always tells such stories long 
before they reach the ears of those most 
concerned, but some whispers had once or 
twice penetrated even to Dr. Dodge’s study 
and disturbed for a little while his calcula- 
tions. Perhaps it was because of them that 
he began to go to the town himself some- 
times when he had errands, instead of send- 
ing, as he had formerly done. 

Returning from one of these trips one 
evening, he paused in the kitchen instead 
of going directly to his room, and drew 
a letter from his pocket : 


TOM^S boy: 


107 


“ Here is something that came to-day, and 
I want to speak about it before I forget it.” 
That was certainly a necessary precaution, 
though any letters that concerned the family 
were so rare that both Unity and E-hoda 
looked up curiously. ‘‘It is from Tom — my 
brother Tom — and he writes that his — one 
of his children — Let me see.” The doc- 
tor straightened his spectacles and fumbled 
over the pages. “ Oh yes ! his boy. I was 
thinking it was a boy.” 

“ What about him ?” asked Ehoda, after 
he had refolded the sheet and neglected to 
give any further information. 

“ Oh, he wants to send him here to stay 
a while. He isn’t very strong — been sick or 
something of the sort — and they think the 
country air will do him good. I suppose,” 
said the doctor, arousing to momentary com- 
bativeness and scorn, “ that the fine fashion 
and style and humbug they live in have 
turned out as I always told Tom they would. 
The youngster has probably been coddled 
and trammeled and trained until there is no 
strength left in him, and now they want to 
send him back to natural life to recuperate. 


108 


UNITY DODGE. 


Folly! However, he’s Tom’s boy, and he 
must come. There’s no need of getting 
ready for him ; let him take us as he finds 
us. Best thing for him. But I must answer 
this and tell Tom to send him, and I wish 
one of you would remind me of it in the 
morning: I may not remember.” 

‘‘If he should happen to forget it en- 
tirely, it wouldn’t cause me any great mourn- 
ing,” said Bhoda, half laughing, though she 
looked annoyed, when he had left the room. 
“It will be a great bother to have a sick 
boy around.” 

But Unity silently resolved that her father 
should not be allowed to forget, and that she 
would attend to the sending of the letter. 
She had often thought of these relatives 
whom she had never seen and of whom 
she seldom heard, wondering what they 
were like and whether, if she knew them, 
they would seem really near to her. Bhoda’s 
sisters, Hely and Sis, were frequent visitors, 
and Bhoda, always glad to have them there, 
often explained, among her other reasons, 
that they were “ such company for Unity.” 
But they were not: contiguity could not 


TOM^S boy: 


109 


make companionship. They were constantly 
together, but Unity whispered to herself, “It 
only makes me feel lonesome.” She did not 
know why ; she often looked at them wist- 
fully and wondered. But they could not 
have explained a fact of the existence of 
which they were unconscious. They were 
“ smart and capable ” in Bhoda’s fashion ; 
they abounded in physical strength and life; 
they liked hurry and bustle and could crowd 
a good deal of hard work into a short time ; 
they knew all about “log-cabin,” “star” and 
other quilts, and had each pieced half a 
dozen or more; and they were “good at 
managing,” that indefinite phrase covering 
a great many things; so they were frequently 
held up to Unity as examples, and she some- 
times tried to emulate them, but never very 
successfully. She always felt relieved when 
one of their visits ended and her little upper 
room was left to her own undisturbed pos- 
session. 

But these unknown cousins might be 
diflferent. The girl found her thoughts 
straying to them through the door this let- 
ter had opened, and away from her school- 


110 


UNITY DODGE. 


books many times that evening. Yet the 
school-books were usually very interesting. 
In the three years since Rhoda came she 
had advanced from the little frame school- 
house to the Centre school, rising rapidly 
as her thirst for knowledge, once awakened, 
grew more eager. 

‘‘ I wonder when he’ll come ?” she said, 
suddenly, late in the evening. 

Who ?” asked Rhoda, looking up from her 
mending ; but when reminded, she laughed 
carelessly : ‘‘ Oh ! I had forgotten him. I 
wish everybody else would, and then there’d 
be an end of all the bother. I don’t know 
when he’ll come. I’m sure ; any time will be 
too soon.” 

That was perhaps the general sentiment, 
though not generally expressed. John mani- 
fested very little interest in the subject, War- 
ren none, and Reub only sneered — he was 
fast acquiring a habit of sneering at most 
things — and averred that ‘‘ the city fellow ” 
would not trouble him much, because he 
would not be troubled by him. 

Unity was the only one who cared enough 
to be even curious ; so it happened naturally, 


TOM^S boy: 


111 


though unexpectedly to her, that when Lester 
Dodge arrived he chiefly sought her compan- 
ionship. He was but little older than she — 
a bright, merry, somewhat spoiled boy, ex- 
ceedingly fond of his own way, but with a 
winsome, coaxing fashion of taking it that 
half veiled from himself and others his 
selfishness in that direction. 

The first day of his visit Unity was 
startled by his voice outside the window at 
which she was sitting : 

“ What are you doing in there?’’ 

Shelling peas,” she answered, recovering 
from her momentary surprise. 

“ Well, can’t you shell them out here 
under the trees ? I don’t want to go in 
there, and I want to talk to you. Come! 
I’ll help you do them — if I can’t coax you 
out in any other way. You see,” he ex- 
plained, when Unity and her basket were 
comfortably established on the grass, “ I 
couldn’t keep up with those fellows out in 
the field. I tried it a little while, but it 
was too hard work ; and, besides, they didn’t 
want me.” 

“ Why, they are real busy,” began Unity, 


112 


UNITY BODOE. 


flushing and trying to soften what she knew 
to be the truth. 

“ Oh, you needn’t take the trouble to 
apologize,” laughed Lester, leaning back 
against a tree and lazily breaking open the 
green pods from the basket ; “ I don’t mind 
it in the least. I didn’t want them, either. 
I supposed I was expected to tramp around 
through the fields, talk about crops I don’t 
know anything about, and admire the pigs 
and cattle ; and I wanted to do my duty, 
that was all. If they are willing to dispense 
with my company, I’m more than willing to 
•be excused. But I want somebody to talk 
to.” He waited a moment, and then mis- 
chievously questioned : ‘‘ Well ? Why don’t 
you talk to me?” 

“ I don’t know what to say,” answered 
Unity, shyly but honestly. This was a new 
type of boyhood to her — as unlike Warren 
and Beub as possible, though she had never 
felt very well acquainted with them. 

‘‘ That’s a funny reason. I thought girls 
could talk straight ahead even when they 
hadn’t anything to say. They do in town, 
any way. Do you like to live out here ?” 


TOM^S boy: 


113 


“ Why, I don’t know.” Unity began to 
ponder the question ; she had never thought 
of living anywhere else. 

“Well, I shouldn’t,” said Master Lester, 
promptly. “ It’s a nice place to come to, 
but I shouldn’t want to stay in it all the 
time. Wait a minute, and I’ll tell you 
why.” Then he began to describe his own 
life at home, and Unity, losing her shyness, 
was soon busily asking questions about her 
aunt and cousins and listening with bright- 
ening eyes to descriptions of their appear- 
ance, home and friends, and to accounts of 
scenes and places new to her. 

Lester liked to hear himself talk at any 
time, and there was additional pleasure in it 
with this eager listener, who seemed to find 
freshness and novelty in even such common- 
place topics. Moreover, he liked her, as he 
had at once declared to himself in his im- 
pulsive fashion ; and so he spared no pains 
minutely to answer her inquiries and pict- 
ure for her the Park and the city, with its 
stores, its churches and its amusements. 

Mistress Rhoda found the process a long 


one. 


114 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘ Unity, haven’t you finished those peas 
yet?” she called. 

‘‘ Yes’m ; ’most done,” Lester answered, 
promptly, before his companion could re- 
ply. “ They wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t 
helped.” 

I don’t know about that,” answered 
Rhoda, doubtfully ; but she withdrew her 
head from the window and waited. 

“ What makes them call you ‘ Unity ’ ?” 
Lester demanded as soon as Rhoda had 
vanished. 

It was the old question, and Unity flushed. 
She had grown painfully sensitive about her 
name ; nevertheless, she gave the accustomed 
explanation — her dying mother’s words. 

‘‘ Well, I think they might have turned 
them to better account, and not have tried 
very hard, either,” commented Lester, with 
a swift mental review of some family habits 
which his boyish eyes had been quick to 
discover. “ ‘Unity’! It’s too long and solemn 
a name — too old-fashioned. Make them call 
you ‘ Una.’ ” 

The girl looked up with a smile, but she 
shook her head : 


TOM^S boy: 


115 


“ That is pretty ; I never thought of that. 
But nobody will call me so.” 

“ I shall. Yes, and the others will too, 
after a while, if anybody begins it. Of 
course you can’t expect them to change all 
at once. Now I’ve told you about my 
home, I want you to show me about yours. 
Can’t we go to the woods this afternoon and 
find some ferns? Flo wanted me to get some 
and press them for her.” 

“Oh, I’d like to. There are plenty of 
them. I don’t know whether I can go to- 
day — ” She hesitated. 

“Why not?” 

He had gathered up basket and dish, and 
was following her into the house. The mo- 
ment they entered he appealed to Bhoda : 

“ Can’t Una go with me to the woods this 
afternoon? I want her to show me where 
to find some ferns.” 

“Who?” asked Bhoda. 

“ My cousin, Una. I’m going to drop the 
‘ t-y, ty ;’ I don’t like it.” 

“ I do,” said Bhoda, shortly. 

“ Do you ?” He looked up with dancing 
eyes, but a sober face. “ Well, then. Cousin 


116 


UNITY DODGE. 


K-hodaty, why can’t we go to the woods? I 
thought this was vacation.” 

Rhoda laughed, though half vexed. She 
had various plans of work for the afternoon. 
Still, it was Unity’s vacation, as he said, though 
that had never made much difference in free- 
dom or pleasure-seeking. But, since the boy 
had been keen enough to notice and speak 
of it, she did not want him ‘‘ telling any 
queer stories when he went home.” 

Bhoda was scarcely conscious of her own 
motive in answering : 

‘‘ Why, yes, I suppose she can go, if she 
wants to, as soon as the dinner is out of the 
way.” 

Unity’s glance of surprise and pleasure 
vexed Rhoda again : it seemed to say that 
her reply had been unexpected. In truth, 
she had not really intended to be harsh or 
unkind to the girl, but ‘‘ the work” was her 
pet idol, and, so long as Unity did not insist 
upon holidays, she reasoned, when she thought 
of it at all, that it was a pity to suggest 
them, and so waste time that might be used 
in housework or sewing. There was likely 
to be a change, however, with Lester Dodge 


TOM’S boy: 


117 


there. She hoped, rather spitefully, that he 
would make his visit short. 

Unity did not share the wish. That after- 
noon was one of the happiest of her life. 
They wandered through the woods laughing 
and singing, she occasionally astonished at 
her own merriment, but finding his spirits 
infectious. He admired and enjoyed her 
favorite nooks ; he told her wonderful stories 
from books he had read and described his 
schools and his studies. She had desired 
his visit only as a means of gratifying her 
curiosity concerning her unknown relatives ; 
she had not expected much of his society 
or anticipated any great pleasure from his 
companionship ; but he brought a world of 
new musings, purposes and ambitions into 
her life. His thoughts, indeed, were shal- 
lower than hers; so far there had been 
nothing in his experience to awaken depth 
or earnestness. The information and the ac- 
quirements which she deemed so wonderful 
were but the result of his daily surround- 
ings, and were superficial enough at best; 
while his easy manner and fiuent tongue 
betrayed the petting and indulgence of the 


118 


UNITY DODGE. 


home that had always given his wishes and 
opinions rather more than due weight. But 
her admiration was very natural. He was 
more nearly brotherly than any brother she 
had ever known ; he was neither super- 
cilious nor boastful of superior advantages, 
and he was sunny-tempered, quick of appre- 
hension and ready to understand her fancies 
and feelings even though they had never 
been his own. She reveled in the new, 
rare pleasure, and her cousinly affection 
grew strong. 

‘‘It seems strange, when we are own 
cousins, that we never saw or knew anything 
of each other until two weeks ago,” she 
said. 

“ Well, why didn’t you write or do some- 
thing to find out about us if you wanted to 
know ?” he questioned. “ Now, to tell the 
honest truth, I never thought anything about 
any of you here until father wanted me to 
come. I believe you have always stood still 
and taken things just as they came to you, 
without ever trying to make them different 
or better. That’s no way to do, Una Dodge. 
But I mean to keep up the acquaintance 


TOM^S boy: 


119 


now, I can tell you. I’ll have Flo out here 
to see you another summer — if she doesn’t 
come before then— and you shall come and 
make us a long visit, too.” 

Unity only smiled ; she had little faith 
in any such brilliant plans, but she meant 
to make the most of the present. 

If he thought her yielding to existing 
circumstances entirely too tame, Lester cer- 
tainly managed matters in a very different 
fashion while he was there, and daringly 
flattered, coaxed or bribed Rhoda into com- 
pliance in a way that was bewildering, and 
that would have been impossible had she 
suspected him of really plotting against any 
of her plans or her theories. Wherever he 
wanted to go he went, and where he went 
he usually contrived to take Unity. So they 
rowed on the river, picked berries in the 
meadow and climbed to the top of Mono- 
teg Hill. 

‘‘Bring your sewing out here, Una, and 
I’ll read you a story while you work,” he 
called from the shady old porch. 

“I don’t know as I approve of reading 
stories,” said Bhoda, a trifle sharply. 


120 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘You dou’t?” Lester leaned his arms 
on the window-sill and looked in at her. 
“ Well, if Una and I must wait for you to 
decide, I think you ought to do it pretty 
soon. Come out here and listen to one of 
them, and then you can tell better whether 
you like it or not. Besides, I want a chance 
to coax you to make a berry shortcake for 
supper. I never tasted any like yours, 
Cousin Bhoda ; I am hungry whenever I 
think of them. Is this the chair you want? 
ril carry it out for you.’’ He sprang through 
the window and audaciously marched oflP with 
chair and work-basket, and Bhoda followed, 
under the impression that he had understood 
her to consent. 

“There are so many kinds of stories ! Of 
course you couldn’t like a good many of 
them,” Lester resumed, with his book open 
upon his knee. “ But my mother is particu- 
lar enough — a little too particular, I think — 
and she says this magazine is the best one 
she ever saw for young people.” Then he 
plunged into his reading without allowing 
opportunity for further comment. 

Bhoda did not listen long. She was not 


TOM^S boy: 


121 


imaginative or literary, and the narrative did 
not attract her. Her thoughts soon wan- 
dered to more interesting matters, and she 
heard little beyond an occasional sentence 
and the continuous murmur of the reader’s 
voice. Having thus neglected her office as 
censor, what could she do but assent when 
he looked up at the close of the story and 
remarked, 

‘‘ There, Cousin E-hoda ! Don’t you say 
there is a good deal of solid history in 
that?” 

Ehoda knew very little of history, solid 
or otherwise, but she reflected that there 
were no wild Indians on the cover of the 
book, and the boy’s mother had been cited 
as approving it ; and, moreover. Unity could 
go on with her work, which made that style 
of recreation more economical than wander- 
ing about through the fields and the woods. 
In any case, she did not want herself to be 
pressed into further listening to anything so 
stupid ; so she offered no more objections, 
and the reading went on day after day, to 
Unity’s great delight. She had read what 
books she could find in her father’s library 


122 


UNITY DODGE. 


— not many to please a girl of her age, for 
she still shrank from all commentaries on 
the sacred writers, and from everything that 
looked as if it might be in any way connected 
with them. But such sketches and books as 
Lester brought were new. 

‘‘ You shall have this magazine all the 
year, Una,” he promised ; ‘‘ I can mail it to 
you when our folks get through with it.” 

So, in countless, trifling ways, unconscious- 
ly to himself and to her, Lester changed 
the tenor of Unity’s life. He was chiefly 
planning a good time for himself while he 
stayed, and incidentally a better time for her 
out of what he could very easily bestow, be- 
cause in his impulsive, warm-hearted way he 
liked her. His persistent changing of her 
name met one very unexpected ally. War- 
ren looked up when he first heard it — at the 
dinner-table one day — glanced from one to 
the other, and after a moment volunteered 
the remark, “ I think that is an improve- 
ment.” Afterward, when he addressed her — 
and such occasions were so rare that it almost 
seemed as if he had made this one — he also 
called her ‘‘ Una.” 


“roiif’6' boy : 


123 


“ Warren is getting new-fangled/’ sneered 
Reuben. 

I think a few new-fangled ways in some 
directions wouldn’t hurt any of us,” answered 
Warren, slowly and with a meaning look in 
his dark eyes that made Reub’s suddenly 
drop to his plate. 

It appeared to Unity that of late Warren’s 
eyes often had a new expression in them — 
one they had never worn before — and that 
she occasionally found them resting upon 
her with a serious, thoughtful look that 
she could not comprehend. At such times it 
almost seemed as if Warren were not so far 
away from her as she had always supposed, 
if only they knew how to make each other’s 
acquaintance. Perhaps she noticed and 
thought of it more because the strange- 
ness of their relation had been revealed more 
clearly by Lester’s talk of his sister and a let- 
ter from her which he had shown. That 
letter especially had been a revelation to 
Unity. In all her life she had received 
but two letters — brief, queerly-spelled epistles 
from Lucretia — and it might have been the 
half-envious longing in her eyes that made 


124 


UNITY DODGE. 


Lester one day toss into her lap the dainty, 
closely- written sheet he had just perused : 

‘‘You may read it if you like. Ifs from 
Flo.’’ 

Very kind in tone it was, full of little 
items of home life and doings and express- 
ing sisterly interest in all his pursuits. It 
abounded in good advice also, and admoni- 
tions which were a trifle stilted and self- 
complacent. But Unity did not notice that. 
She only thought it beautiful, and wondered 
how Flora could write it. She could not 
fancy herself daring to write to Warren or 
Beub in that way. 

“ How good she must be !” she commented, 
admiringly. 

Lester screwed his face into an odd 
grimace : 

“Oh, Flo always writes a sermon and 
takes me for her wicked congregation. She 
thinks it’s her duty to put all that in, but 
generally I skip it.” Then, as he saw Unity’s 
face, he laughed carelessly : “ You needn’t 
look shocked. Flo and I are fond of each 
other, you understand, but she is so dread- 
fully good that it’s enough for one family 


TOM^S boy: 


125 


without *my undertaking anything in the 
same line. By the way, she would be giving 
you some lessons about keeping watch over 
your brothers if she were here. Does Reub 
always insist upon walking on the roof at 
night r’ 

“ Beub ? What do you mean ?” 

Unity dropped the letter, but Lester deftly 
caught it and replaced it in its envelope as 
he replied : 

“ Nothing, only Tve seen somebody on 
the porch-roof two nights, and each time 
it proved to be Beub creeping along in his 
stocking-feet. I know it was Reub, though 
I did not speak and he did not see me. It’s 
a funny place for a midnight promenade.” 

But Unity did not smile. She suspected 
that Beub had found a way of evading his 
father’s late command — which the doctor had 
attempted to enforce with more vigilance than 
for years he had bestowed upon any household 
arrangement — that the boy’s visits to the Cen- 
tre and his remaining away from home until 
a late hour of the night should cease. In her 
newly-awakening sense of sisterly responsi- 
bility, Unity wondered whether, if she had 


126 


UNITY DODGE. 


known and thought of these things earlier, 
it would have made any difference. If she 
had been like Flora, she questioned, with a 
vague feeling of trouble, would Warren and 
Feub have been different? 


CHAPTER yi. 


SWEPT AWAY. 

A S the weeks passed on and Lester went 
home, so that her life dropped more 
nearly into its old channel, Unity grew in- 
creasingly anxious concerning Heub. It 
might have been partly her clearer vision, 
but she saw many things unnoticed before ; 
and Heub certainly grew more discontented, 
wdllful and unmanageable. The change in 
Warren was more subtle and undefinable. 
Whatever path he was traveling, it seemed 
no longer to be Heub’s. His sister won- 
dered at him often, but her fears were for 
the younger brother. Very vague they 
were. Her fourteen years of life had 
brought her little knowledge of the world 
or of human nature, and she scarcely knew 
what she feared, or why. Once, when she 
was standing in a store in the village, Reub 

127 


128 


UNITY DODGE. 


had passed the open door, and she overheard 
one man say to another, 

“ That boy is going to the dogs about as 
fast as he can manage it/’ 

Unity pondered the remark during all her 
homeward walk; it haunted her at night and 
finally prompted her to something she rarely 
did : she asked Khoda’s interpretation of its 
meaning. 

But Bhoda answered half impatiently : 

I’m sure I don’t know. He torments 
John nearly to death with the way he 
shirks the work, and only half does what 
little he pretends to do. I think his father 
ought to put a stop to it. See there. Unity ! 
You are sewing that sleeve in wrong-side 
up.” 

Rhoda used her mouth as a receptacle for 
pins for a minute or two while she altered 
the pattern she was fastening upon a piece 
of cloth ; and when her organs of speech 
were once more free, she added : 

‘‘ Well, nobody can say I haven’t done my 
duty by him and all the rest since I came 
here; and if Reub goes to destruction, he 
has nobody but himself to thank for it : 


SWEPT AWAY. 


129 


that’s one comfort.” It did not appear 
particularly comforting to Reub’s sister, but 
she said nothing more. 

John’s complaints, indeed, grew incessant. 
Reub would not do this, Reub neglected 
that. He could not trust the worthless 
fellow to attend to anything, and he did 
not believe in working himself to death to 
keep up such laziness. Reub would have 
to change if he stayed there much longer. 
All this, chiefly at Rhoda’s suggestion, was 
frequently poured into the doctor’s ears, and 
that preoccupied gentleman had bestowed 
upon the matter more attention than any- 
thing outside of his study had won from 
him within Unity’s recollection. But all 
his sharp denunciations and strenuous pro- 
hibitions — the more sharp and the more 
strenuous because of his annoyance at be- 
ing so constantly forced to consider a sub- 
ject that interfered with his studies — all 
John’s bitter faultflnding and half threats, 
only seemed to chafe and irritate Reub, ren- 
dering him more determined to pursue his 
own course so far as it was in his power to 
do so. 


130 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘And now my young gentleman has de- 
cided to stay in bed and let me get through 
the morning work without any of his help/’ 
said John, one misty morning, as he arose 
from the table. “ I called him twice with- 
out any answer before I went out to the 
barn, and now he isn’t even down for break- 
fast. I suppose he will be along by eight or 
nine o’clock and want something specially 
nice.” 

“ It’s very little he will find, then,” said 
Rhoda, shortly, beginning to clear the table 
after the early meal. 

“ I suppose he was on some spree last 
night until nobody knows what time, and 
so he is making up for it by lying in bed 
this morning,” pursued John. — “ Was he, 
father?” 

The doctor had been absently matching 
his knife and fork together as if they were 
two parts of a difiicult problem. He dropped 
them at the question — to the great relief of 
Rhoda, who immediately bore them away 
with the other utensils — and looked up in 
bewilderment : 

“ ‘ Sleep’ ? What did you say, John?” 


SWEPT AWAY. 


131 


I asked you if Keub came in late last 
night/’ 

“ I — I don’t remember.” Dr. Dodge 
rubbed his head as if to awaken his recol- 
lection. ‘‘ I don’t believe I saw him last 
night. In fact, I shouldn’t be surprised if 
I forgot to lock the door at all. I was very 
busily occupied in trying to reach the exact 
meaning of the word commonly rendered 
‘Apollyon.’ If a new meaning can be given 
to that — which I think is very possible — it 
will alter the whole sentence. It is a very 
interesting question — very.” Then, slowly 
arousing to an inspection of the face opposite 
him, he was recalled to a remembrance of the 
original question, and observed hastily, as 
he arose from his seat, “ But about the boy. 
Such doings really must be stopped. Where 
did you say he stayed so very late last night, 
John ?” 

I don’t know anything about it ; I only 
supposed he had been off somewhere because 
he is in bed so late this morning — though 
perhaps he has concluded that lying in bed 
is the only part of farm-work that suits 
him,” answered John, not feeling in a mood 


132 


UNITY DODGE. 


to be particularly respectful toward his 
father, to say nothing of entertaining any 
charity for Reub. 

The old doctor sighed. This world, when 
he did return to it, was not a very pleasant 
place to him. He turned to Unity: 

“ When Reuben comes down, tell him that 
I want to see him.’’ 

But Reub did not come, and John, tiring 
at last of doing without him, went again to 
the foot of the stairs with a sharper sum- 
mons. 

“ I don’t believe he is sleeping to any such 
exten t as that,” said John, mounting the stairs 
with quick, angry strides. 

He came down in a minute or two more 
slowly and with a puzzled look: 

“He is not there.” 

“Slipped off to get his breakfast some- 
where else, or to go without it for the sake 
of shirking the work,” commented Rhoda. 

“ No ; he has not been there — at least, the 
bed does not look as if it had been slept in 
last night,” answered John. 

“ I wish I had the managing of him for 
a while,” said his wife, with a significant 


SWEPT AWAY. 


133 


nod of her head which seemed to imply 
that E,eub would either be reformed or be 
crushed in an exceedingly brief period. 

“ I think you have managed already — 
considerably,” observed Warren. 

The remark irritated John, as Warren’s 
slow, cool remarks often did even when he 
scarcely comprehended them. He turned 
upon his brother and demanded gruffly : 

“Where is E-eub?” 

“ It might be as well to ask first whether 
I know,” suggested Warren. “ It happens 
that I don’t.” 

But when the dinner- hour arrived and 
Beub had not appeared, Warren was again 
appealed to for information, this time by 
his father, though the doctor might have 
forgotten the boy’s absence at breakfast if 
the others had not alluded to it. 

“He said something about going out on 
the river to fish a little while before dark. 
That was just after supper last evening; 
I haven’t seen him since,” said Warren. 

For once. Dr. Dodge was fairly aroused. 
He pushed back his chair and stared at 
Warren in surprise and alarm : 


134 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘ Went out on the river last night and 
not come back yet! What in the world 
possessed you, Warren, that you did not tell 
this sooner? Why, he may be — Some 
accident may have happened.” 

‘‘ Not much danger of his being drowned,” 
said Rhoda, giving the personal pronoun an 
emphasis which made the remark as near an 
approach as she dared venture, in the pres- 
ence of her father-in-law, to a quotation of 
the old proverb. 

No one answered her, and even John 
looked slightly troubled, though after a 
minute or two he said. 

Oh, I expect he’s safe enough. He 
probably went somewhere else.” He spoke 
to his father, but the doctor had speedily 
put on his hat, and, instead of going hack 
to his study, had gone out for the purpose of 
making inquiries. 

But at the end of the lane the old gentle- 
man was met by a boy coming toward the 
house : 

‘‘ Is Beub at home ? I came to ask him 
if this is his hat. We found it in a boat 
that had floated down against Stony Point, 


t 



% 


Is this Reub’s hat ? 


Page 134 




SWEPT AWAY. 


135 


and I thought maybe he left it when he 
was out fishing.” 

“ Did you see him when he was going out 
last night ?” demanded the doctor. “ He 
hasn’t come home yet.” 

“ Has — n’t !” The boy uttered only the 
one word, but the tone of his voice was 
full of consternation. 

“ I don’t know whether this is his hat,” 
began the doctor, fumbling the article ner- 
vously. 

“ I know it is,” interposed the boy, de- 
cidedly ; but I didn’t think he was — ” 

John, Rhoda and Unity also identified 
the hat the moment they saw it, and im- 
mediately the old farmhouse was in a state 
of excitement. Inquiries soon disclosed the 
fact that Reub had not been seen in the 
village the previous evening, and his dis- 
appearance, together with the drifting boat 
and the hat, could suggest but one conclu- 
sion. People looked in the father’s face 
and said nothing — a silence that said every- 
thing. Warm-hearted neighborliness flamed 
into life at once. Women came to the house 
with offers of assistance where none was 


136 


UNITY DODGE. 


needed, and men were soon busy searching 
along the shore and out on the river. 

It was strange how suddenly all the irri- 
tation and annoyance caused by the boy’s 
faults and follies sank into nothingness. 
John spoke with lowered tone of ‘‘ poor 
Reub !” and Rhoda took one of his nu- 
merous fancies in fishing-tackle down from 
a nail where always before it had vexed her 
to find it, and laid it away with a quiet gen- 
tleness that was almost tenderness. 

The water was dragged and searched in 
vain ; the long day wore slowly away with- 
out bringing tidings. For once the doctor’s 
study was deserted and books and papers 
were neglected. The farm that had so 
needed Reub’s help in the morning was 
left without John’s all day while he lin- 
gered among the groups on the river. At 
the house Rhoda and Unity started at 
every step that neared the door, but no 
one brought the message for which they 
looked — or for which Rhoda looked, for 
Unity scarcely expected the search to be 
successful. She could not have explained 
to lierself why she did not fully share the 


SWEPT AWAY. 


137 


horrible dread of the others. Her heart 
was heavy with a burden of impending 
evil, but she could not feel that the river 
held the key to the secret. 

It might have been Warren^s face, to 
which his sister’s eyes were constantly 
drawn, that suggested her disbelief in the 
theories so generally adopted. He had 
joined the others in the search, but he 
said nothing. He had expressed no opin- 
ion, offered no suggestion, all the day ; but 
Unity fancied his grave face and manner 
were perplexed rather than expectant. Just 
at sunset he was standing on the porch, when 
a man came up, paused a moment with a pity- 
ing glance from brother to sister and said hesi- 
tatingly, 

‘‘We have found nothing yet. Most like- 
ly the — Likely it’s been carried down the 
river, or else been caught and held by some- 
thing under the water. We won’t give up 
looking, though.” 

As he passed on. Unity looked up at 
Warren. 

“You do not believe Reub is drowned ?” 
she said, in a low tone. Only the excite- 


138 


VNITY DODGE. 


ment of the hour had prompted the remark. 
She was so unused to seeking Warren’s con- 
fidence on any subject that she wondered at 
herself the next minute. 

But Warren answered quietly enough, as 
if unnoticing the strangeness of the ques- 
tion : 

“No. I don’t know anything about it, 
though, but I can’t feel that he’s there. 
He has said so many things lately about 
going off somewhere — that he wouldn’t stay 
here with John ordering about and Bhoda 
acting as if she owned everything ; that he 
was sick of farm-life, any way ; and things 
of that sort. His staying away all night 
didn’t frighten me : it isn’t the first time 
he’s done that, by a good many, though I 
suppose the rest didn’t know it. I’ve tried 
to stop it, but I couldn’t. Reub has been 
pretty wild lately. I’ve expected that he’d 
go off somewhere before long. He’s so used 
to the water it don’t seem as if anything 
would have been likely to happen to him 
there. Still, I can’t understand about the 
boat and the hat. Beub wouldn’t have set 
them adrift for the sake of making father 


SWEPT AWAY. 


139 


and all of them think what they do; he 
wouldn’t have done so cruel a thing as 
that. I don’t know anything about it: 
that’s all I can tell you.” 

Unity had half hoped that Warren knew 
something more, but even in the midst of 
her anxiety she felt a little thrill of pleas- 
ure that he had answered her so fully and 
frankly. There was nothing more to be 
learned ; she could only wait. 

Presently, Warren went away again ; the 
long evening wore on, and Phoda and Unity 
sat by the fire, talking but little and listen- 
ing to every sound that might be made by 
an approaching step. 

“ There will be a great deal of extra 
expense,” said Phoda, rousing from a long 
reverie. “We shall have to plan for that — 
mourning, and everything.” 

Unity shuddered. 

“He isn’t — found yet,” she urged. 

“ That won’t make any difference about 
our wearing mourning ; we’ll have to do 
that just the same as soon as we are sure 
he can’t be found. And there will be other 
things, too,” Phoda answered, reflectively, 


140 


UNITY DODGE. 


then added, with a half sigh and in a lower 
tone, ‘‘ Poor Peub ! If s queer to be talking 
of him in this way.’’ 

The next day passed as the first had done. 
All efibrt was unavailing, and at last was 
reluctantly abandoned. There remained, 
kindly voices whispered to one another, but 
the possibility that the body might yet be 
washed ashore at some point far down the 
river. Even that faint hope died out when 
a week had dragged slowly by and brought 
no tidings. Then one day a report — circu- 
lated no one quite knew how or by whom — 
reached the farmhouse that a man just re- 
turned from a neighboring city had laughed 
when he heard, among other items of local 
news, of this sad event that had occurred 
during his absence. He declared that 
Reuben Dodge was not drowned, for he 
had seen him alive and well with a circur 
company. 

“ I don’t believe it,” said Rhoda, promptly. 
She was beginning to grow accustomed to 
the thought that Reub was drowned, and 
she did not like theories that upset her 
established order of doing and thinking. 


SWEPT AWAY. 


141 


Besides, though she had told no one of the 
purchase, she had already bought material 
for black dresses for herself and Unity, 
arguing that it was ‘‘ better to be in season, 
instead of waiting till things must be had 
in a rush, and then, maybe, have to pay 
double price for them.” Bhoda always found 
it difficult to believe that any providing of 
hers could turn out to be undue haste. 

“ The man has probably seen somebody 
that looked like Beub,” suggested John. 

A sudden light of intelligence flashed into 
Warren’s face, however, and after a moment 
he said slowly, glancing at his father, 

‘‘ There was a circus up the river that 
night, I remember — up at Waynesdale.” 

I shall soon know,” said the doctor, with 
a peculiar rigid look about his lips, as if 
some stern determination were graving its 
lines there, and he left the house and walked 
out toward the stable. A few minutes later 
Unity saw him lead his horse down the 
walk, mount and ride away. 

The whole story of that afternoon — how 
he traced the rumor, found the man and the 
entire conversation that ensued — Dr. Dodge 


142 


UNITY DODGE. 


never told. He came back just at nightfall, 
and entered the old kitchen with a slow step 
when they were all gathered there. 

‘‘ Well ?” questioned Hhoda, with as near 
an approach to impatience as she ever ven- 
tured upon with this father-in-law of whom, 
notwithstanding her scorn of all his vagaries, 
she yet stood slightly in awe. 

The doctor turned and faced the group. 

“ It is true,” he said, with almost painful 
distinctness and deliberateness, as if he were 
repeating some carefully-prepared formula ; 

he is living. Mr. Nelson saw him and 
spoke with him ; so there can be no mistake. 
Heuben told him he had found something he 
liked better than farm-work — a low, worth- 
less life among a set of vile, miserable rope- 
dancers and jugglers. He is no son of mine. 
He has no home here after this, and no part 
or lot in anything that belongs to me. I 
never want to hear his name again and 
the doctor took his lamp and went up to his 
solitary study. All his education and prej- 
udices, his contempt for shams and frivolities, 
his family pride, combined to make the boy’s 
course the most obnoxious that could have 


SWEPT AWAY. 


143 


been chosen. The father’s bitter wrath and 
mortification seemed greater than his grief. 

“ Well, that’s the end of that,” said 
K-hoda, drawing a long breath, as the meas- 
ured step died away upon the stairs and the 
faint sound of the closing door reached them 
from the room above. 

But it was not the end of it, for a few 
days later there arrived for Dr. Dodge a 
letter which all were sure was from Beub. 
Bhoda ventured to express her opinion to that 
effect as she handed him the missive when he 
came down to dinner. 

If it is, it concerns no one but myself, 
and I shall know what to do with it,” 
answered the doctor, with grim quietness, 
glancing hurriedly over the two pages that 
displayed chiefly Beub’s lack of scholarship, 
and then tossed the sheet into the fire. 

One thing I want to know, father,” inter- 
posed Warren, quietly: ‘Moes he know what 
we — what you — first thought had happened ? 
If he had meant to deceive us in any such 
way, I do not see why he should have 
written now.” 

The doctor hesitated a moment, as if un- 


144 


UNITY DODGE. 


certain whether to vouchsafe any reply, but 
finally answered : 

‘‘ He says that he rowed up to Waynesdale 
for the purpose of attending that mummery 
show — circus or whatever they are pleased to 
call it — and of joining it if he had a chance 
and liked it. — Liked it!” the doctor repeat- 
ed, with scornful emphasis. — “He says that 
when he attempted to fasten his boat the 
rope broke and slipped from his hand, and 
while he was trying to regain it his hat blew 
off and he lost hat and boat together. He 
writes that he had just heard that we feared 
he was drowned, and so sent the letter to 
relieve our minds. As if it could be any 
relief to know that he has sunk to such a 
life as that ! I shall write just so much of 
an answer as will prevent his sending any 
more letters or ever claiming any relation- 
ship here again. And now never ask me 
any more questions about him ; never bring 
me any word of him, whatever happens. 
As I said before, I never want to hear his 
name again.” 

“ He is right enough, too,” declared Hhoda 
as the doctor disappeared. If chagrin at the 


SWEPT AWAY. 


145 


thought of those needlessly purchased dresses 
and a flitting reflection that, with Reub cut 
off from the property, there would be the 
more to divide among the other children, 
had anything to do with her prompt sanc- 
tion of her father-in-law’s wrath, she did 
not know it. She thought she was shocked 
at the course the boy had chosen and in- 
dignant at his treatment of his friends ; but 
wounded vanity and selfishness lie at the 
root of much that we dignify as righteous 
indignation. 

While they believed the boy dead they 
had called in the aid of neighbors and 
friends, searched the river up and down 
and dragged the sands beneath the water 
in the mere hope of regaining the lifeless 
body, but Keuben living, drifting out on a 
tide that they believed dangerous to both 
body and soul, they made no effort to rescue. 
They quietly let him go and turned back to 
their accustomed ways. There was no need 
of mourning, and Rhoda made as good a 
bargain as possible in returning the unused 
goods to the store. John found a boy who 
more than compensated for Reub’s irregular 
10 


146 


UNITY DODGE. 


services, at less expense — though Reub had 
never received anything in the way of wages, 
that, indeed, being one of his grievances. 
The doctor went back to his study again, 
and his night-lamp burned later than ever. 
As this world grew less satisfactory to him 
he became increasingly anxious to find out 
just when it would end, and pondered more 
and more intently the hidden meaning of 
the ‘‘times’’ in Daniel and the vials in the 
Revelation, but he slipped by one solemn 
question : 

“ Seeing then that all these things shall 
be dissolved, what manner of persons ought 
ye to be in all holy conversation and godli- 
ness ?” 

The Master’s “seventy times seven” was 
the one number he did not study. Even 
had he done so, would it have occurred 
to him that it could possibly refer to poor 
Reub? 


CHAPTEE VII. 

THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 

A FEW months later Warren created an- 
other ripple of excitement at the farm- 
house by announcing his intention of leav- 
ing home the next summer. 

“ Do you too want to go to destruction ?” 
questioned his father, sharply, alluding more 
directly to Keub by that last word than he 
had done before. 

‘‘No, ' sir,” responded Warren, calmly. 
“ There are other trades as useful and hon- 
est as farming, and I want to try one of 
them : that is all.” 

“You’d better stay where you are,” said 
the doctor, still shortly. 

“You gave up farming for something you 
liked better, father,” suggested Warren. 

“ I ? Well — ” The father sighed, but 
the words had recalled his studies, and with 
them his accustomed train of thought; and 

J47 


148 


UNITY DODGE. 


after a moment’s abstraction he added in a 
gentler tone : 

‘‘ I’ve learned this much from it, at least — 
that unless my calculations are all wrong the 
time is growing short now. It is of no use 
for you to make any ambitious plans for 
getting rich ; this world will not last long 
enough for you to carry them out.” 

‘‘ It will probably last as long as I want it 
to unless it offers me something pleasanter 
than it ever has yet,” said Warren, moodily. 
“ However, if you think everything is going 
to end so soon, father, what difference does 
it make whether I am here on the farm or 
in some office or workshop in Waynesdale ? 
I don’t see why I may not as well have my 
choice.” 

No ; it can’t make much difference, so 
long as it is some honest and respectable 
calling : that is true,” admitted the doctor, 
slowly. “ It seems useless to change, that is 
all. I don’t suppose it can make any great 
difference ;” and with that consideration the 
doctor gradually subsided into tacit acquies- 
ence. 

John was disgusted, but he could not 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 


149 


arouse his father to any further opposition ; 
and Warren, having clearly defined his pur- 
pose, said no more of his plans, but seemed 
to have resolved to render such effective 
service upon the farm for the few months 
remaining as should leave no ground for 
complaint. 

It was during these months — the summer 
following Lester’s visit — that a dainty little 
epistle from Flora announced her intention 
of coming soon to spend a few weeks, “ if 
convenient.” 

“ Well, it’s not convenient,” snapped 
Rhoda, tired with a warm day’s work and 
worry. 

“We have other visitors — relatives of 
other members of the family : I do not see 
why Una should not have her cousin come 
and see her if she wishes it,” said Warren, 
pointedly. 

“ Girls who can come here and make 
themselves useful are very different from a 
fashionable city lady all fancies, fiounces and 
ruffles,” retorted Rhoda, flushing. “ She will 
want some one to do up all her muslins and 
finery, I suppose, but she need not expect it 


150 


UNITY DODGE. 


from me/’ she added as Warren walked out 
of the room whistling carelessly. 

Unity, while wonderingly grateful for 
his prompt speech in her behalf, was not 
quite certain whether she really did wish 
her cousin to come. She stood somewhat in 
awe of the “ ruffles and flounces,” but still 
more of Flora’s accomplishments, graces and 
goodness as her own fancy had pictured 
them. Lester had kept his promise of send- 
ing books and papers, and soon after his 
return Flora had begun to write letters — 
delicately-tinted sheets, elegantly worded — 
to ‘‘ dear Cousin Una,” with whom she hoped 
‘‘ to grow better acquainted and Unity 
had replied by timid little missives carefully 
studied. And now this had grown out of 
the correspondence ! Cousin Flora at a dis- 
tance, to be admired, dreamed over and 
reverenced, with an occasional letter as a 
connecting-link, was a great treasure, but to 
have her drop down into the homely daily 
life at the farm was another thing. 

Unity’s perplexity at the prospect was 
greater than her pleasure, and she sighed as 
she looked around her plain little room. 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 


151 


“ I’m afraid she will be disappointed when 
she sees it all — when she knows me just as 
I am,” she said. ‘‘ She won’t want to stay, 
and, oh dear ! I shall not know what to do 
with her if she does.” 

There was nothing to be done, however, 
but to receive Flora as cordially as possible, 
for Unity’s own letters had echoed — sin- 
cerely, too, at the time — Flora’s wish that 
they might become better acquainted. But 
Unity had not thought of a visit as anything 
but a far-distant possibility, while Flora had 
planned for it all along, and did not dream 
that it was unexpected or would produce any 
consternation. 

Fortunately, Dr. Dodge was going to the 
village on the day of her arrival, and so 
could meet her at the station ; and, though 
Bhoda muttered, half laughingly, that ‘Ut 
would be a blessing if he forgot her,” he 
did nothing of the kind, but brought a 
slender, fair-faced, graceful girl home with 
him in the old chaise. 

At the first glimpse of that daintily-at- 
tired figure, where material, color and ar- 
rangement seemed to blend harmoniously 


152 


UNITY DODGE. 


and make up one faultless whole, Unity felt 
her own dress grow still more ill-fitting and 
awkward. She almost envied Rhoda’s serene 
complacency, that had no thought of any 
superiority except in herself. Unity felt, 
without being able to explain even to her- 
self, the incongruity between that quietly 
elegant figure and the stiff gaudy parlor that 
Rhoda had thrown open with the avowed 
purpose of ‘‘letting her see that we are as 
good as anybody.’’ And the room up stairs 
would be far worse. 

But when Unity’s reluctant feet had led 
the way thither, Flora did not appear to 
notice either the faded carpet, the old-fash- 
ioned bureau with its cracked glass or the 
shabby wash-stand. She turned to Unity 
as soon as they were alone together and, 
placing a hand on each shoulder, said, with 
a kiss, 

“ And you are my own cousin — the only 
girl-cousin I have in the world ! You have 
no sister, Una, nor have I : don’t you think 
we ought to care a great deal for each other ? 
At least, I mean to love you just as much as 
I please.” 


THE PATTERN FROM HOME. 153 

‘‘ I’m afraid that won’t be very much,” 
answered Unity, laughing shyly, though 
with tears of pleasure and gratitude shining 
in her eyes. 

‘‘ Won’t it, though !” said Flora, with a 
gay little nod of her graceful head that 
made the words emphatic. ‘‘ Lester has told 
me about you.” 

How pretty she was ! Unity’s lonely heart 
went out to her at once, and long before that 
first toilet was over — for Flora insisted that 
Una must stay with her while she brushed 
her hair and rearranged her dress for din- 
ner — they were talking more confidentially 
than Unity had ever before talked with any 
girl. She had so long admired and rever- 
enced Flora at a distance that there was 
neither questioning nor distrust to be over- 
come ; she felt only a wondering delight 
that her paragon could come near enough 
to her to be loved. 

Khoda’s black eyes looked an expressive 
and somewhat scornful interrogation when, 
an hour later, she saw the girls come down 
with arms twined around each other. The 
arrangement had been Flora’s, and she did 


154 


UNITY DODGE. 


not seem to notice the glance bestowed upon 
it any more, apparently, than she noticed 
many discordant elements in the household 
and its life which revealed themselves that 
afternoon. The easy grace with which she 
adjusted herself to circumstances, the sweet- 
ness that interpreted every remark in its 
best possible meaning, the tact that was so 
unconscious in some directions, so quick to 
find a smooth line through the tangles that 
were constantly arising, won from Unity a 
steadily increasing admiration and molli- 
fied even Rhoda’s prejudices; so that she 
observed, as she washed the supper-dishes, 

“She’s not so full of airs and notions, 
after all. She’s dreadfully gentle and soft- 
spoken — too milk-and- watery to amount to 
much, I guess; but I don’t believe she’s 
going to be as much bother as we expected. 
That’s one comfort.” 

Unity lingered down stairs that night to 
help, as usual, in arranging for the early 
breakfast. When she went up to her own 
room, she found Flora standing by the old 
bureau with an open book before her. She 
looked around with a smile as Unity entered. 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 155 

“ I waited for you. I thought it would be 
so pleasant to read together to night and 
she touched the little book, which Unity saw 
at a glance was a Bible. Where are you 
reading now?’’ 

“ I — ” Unity looked into her face, hesi- 
tated a moment, and then answered honestly : 
‘‘ I am not reading anywhere.” 

But Flora did not understand : 

‘‘ Oh ! You read here and there as it hap- 
pens — as you feel? I do that sometimes, 
but not usually. Well, then you won’t 
mind taking my psalm to-night. I like to 
come back to that often ; it is such a sweet 
good-night psalm and the slender white 
finger pointed to its beginning and the soft 
voice read the words : 

“ I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, 
from whence cometh my help. 

My help cometh from the Lord, which 
made heaven and earth. 

‘‘ He will not suffer thy foot to be moved : 
he that keepeth thee will not slumber. 

Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall 
neither slumber nor sleep.” 

Flora slowly repeated : 


156 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘ ^ He that keepeth thee will not slum- 
ber.’ I like to think of that, don’t you ?” 

Unity never had thought of it, and the 
remembrance of an unslumbering, watchful, 
omniscient Eye always fixed upon her was 
assuredly not pleasant. She shuddered : 

“ Oh, Flora, I’m not like you — not good ; 
and it is all so dreadful !” She sighed. 

“ ‘ Dreadful ’?” Flora turned away from 
the book and looked at her in unfeigned 
astonishment. “ Not dreadful to think that 
even while we are sleeping our Father is 
keeping kind, careful, loving watch over us. 
You do not mean that? I do not under- 
stand you.” 

“No, I suppose not ; but I am not good 
like you,” repeated Unity, slowly, “and I 
don’t think — At least, it doesn’t seem as 
if there were any loving watch kept over 
me. And it is all so dreadful about the 
‘ vials of wrath ’ and the ‘ last plagues,’ 
though I don’t know what they are, except 
a great awful something coming nearer and 
nearer every day to crush the world and 
every one on it. It seems so horrible some- 
times that I wish I could get away from it 


THE PATTERN PROM TOWN. 157 

anywhere. There is no comfort only in try- 
ing not to think about it at all.’’ 

“ You poor little — ” “ Heathen,” Flora 

had almost said ; but she checked the last 
word unspoken. ‘‘ What a strange way to 
think of the Bible ! Did you never read 
‘There is therefore now no condemnation 
to them which are in Christ Jesus ’?” 

“ No ; I do not know. I have not read 
much,” Unity confessed, reluctantly. She 
shrank from the whole subject. “ Father 
reads it, and — I have not wanted to.” 

Some things which she had heard inter- 
preted the strangeness of that last sentence 
to Flora. 

“Poor little Una!” she exclaimed, pity- 
ingly, with her soft white hands clasping 
her cousin’s browned and roughened ones. 
“ Do you suppose the Lord Jesus seemed a 
dreadful visitor to those homes in Palestine 
where he healed their sick, restored sight to 
their blind and gave their dead back to their 
arms ? And is it awful for us to think that 
he cares for us in just the same way now — 
that he is ready to answer our prayers, heal 
our sorrows, save us from our sins, protect 


158 


UNITY DODGE. 


those we love and carry us safely through 
life and death?’' 

No, no ! Oh, if he could be that to any 
one !” exclaimed Unity, with a deep breath, 
a hungering earnestness in her eyes. 

‘‘He is that to me,” answered Flora, softly. 
“ Come, Una ; let us read the story together 
while I am here;” and she turned to the be- 
ginning of the Gospels. 

Three years older than Una, her superior 
in education and culture — that much-abused 
word of many meanings — fair, gentle and 
winning, was it strange that she seemed 
almost an angel of loveliness and goodness 
to the young girl that night, or that the 
lonely, hungry heart at once went out to 
her? That was the beginning of many 
readings, of many long talks, and slowly 
there grew in Unity’s mind some compre- 
hension of the love and grace, the power 
and tenderness, of the One who came, not 
to condemn the world, but to save the 
world. Into her heart came a great long- 
ing to be one of his own, to have for her- 
self this treasure which made her cousin’s 
life so radiant. 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 


159 


Meanwhile, Flora seemed quite at home in 
the old farmhouse. She busied herself with 
books and letters while Unity was occupied 
with housework, and whenever the latter 
could gain leisure they wandered off to- 
gether for long rambles in the woods and 
by the riverside. Flora often spoke of 
home and her friends there, but seemed 
quite satisfied with Unity’s companionship. 

“ Little wonder she likes you,” said E-hoda, 
when one day Unity inadvertently commented 
upon the fact in a wondering, grateful way. 
‘‘ Why shouldn’t she, when you praise her 
and pet her from morning till night, run 
up stairs and down for her, and heat your- 
self nearly to death to make custards just 
the way she likes them or do up ruffles fit 
for Her Ladyship to wear ? She never 
offers to help you.” 

“ She doesn’t know how,” answered Unity. 

‘‘ She might learn,” replied Ehoda, sharp- 
ly ; ‘‘ but it’s a good deal easier to say, ‘Dear 
Cousin Una, it’s too bad for you to work 
so!’ Of course she likes to be worshiped and 
treated as if she were above common clay — 
who wouldn’t? — but it’s always you that 


160 


UNITY DODOE. 


carry the bundles and make a way through 
the rough places. I believe you’d lie down 
in the mud any time, Unity Dodge, and let 
her walk over you, rather than have her get 
her dainty feet wet. Yes, I should suppose 
she’d like you. Who braided her long hair 
for her this afternoon, I’d like to know, after 
working over the ironing-table all the morn- 
ing while she lay on the lounge?” 

But Unity did not answer. ‘‘Flora has 
done so much more than that for me — so 
much more than I can ever do for her,” 
she thought, with a grateful throb of her 
loving heart. Life, its meanings, its pur- 
poses, its whole outlook, was changing for 
her since her cousin came. A new peace 
and a new hope were taking the place of 
the old dread. And, besides finding a heav- 
enly Friend, when had she ever before been 
so rich in human friendship as now ? 

Flora sat on the old vine-shaded porch 
and looked up at the fiushed face that joined 
her : 

“Tired, aren’t you? Come here and sit 
by me in the shade and rest. You are a 
great deal more useful than I am, Una.” 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN 161 

Unity looked admiringly at the crown of 
fair hair and at the white, delicate hands that 
were playing with the vine-leaves, and shook 
her head deprecatingly : 

“ You know better than that, Flo darling. 
I can do only rough, common things, but 
you — Think of all you can do, of all 
you have done for me.’’ 

Flora laughed softly, not ill-pleased, 
though she only said, 

“You think me better than I am.” 

After a moment she asked, 

“ This is Wednesday night, isn’t it ? 
Don’t any of you ever go to the prayer- 
meeting ?” 

“‘Prayer-meeting’!” repeated Unity, be- 
wildered. “ I don’t know whether there is 
one or not. Why do you think there is ?” 
Then, as she watched her cousin’s face, she 
added : “ There may be one in the village, 
you know. Flora, but that is some dis- 
tance — too far for us to go in the evening. 
And, really, I do not know anything about 
it.” 

“I suppose it is too far for us to go 
alone — for you to go regularly,” answered 
11 


162 


VNITY DODGE. 


Flora, gravely. “I did not think of that; 
I always go at home. It will be a great 
loss to you, Una.” 

“If you want to go to-night, I will go 
with you,” said Warren, suddenly appearing 
in the doorway behind them — “that is, if 
you do not mind the walk. We cannot 
very well have the horses; they have been 
working all day.” 

Unity was too much surprised by his 
unexpected appearance and such an utterly 
unlooked-for proposal to say anything, but 
Flora turned with her quick, bright smile : 

“ Oh, thank you. Cousin Warren ! That 
is very kind. — Of course we will be glad 
to go, won^t we, Una?” 

Thus appealed to, Una assented, though 
she could not appreciate the loss of such 
a service as Flora did, and she was, more- 
over, too tired to enjoy the prospect of a 
walk to the village. Wonder at Warren, 
however, predominated for the time over 
every other feeling. He had apparently be- 
stowed but little attention upon his cousin so 
far — no more than would scantily satisfy the 
requirements of ordinary politeness. If he 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN 


163 


had ever before overheard or felt an in- 
terest in any of their conversations, he had 
given no token of it, Unity reflected, and 
what freak possessed him now ? She watch- 
ed him curiously during that quiet walk 
in the early twilight, but his face revealed 
nothing new, and his manner seemed to say 
that in offering to be their escort he had 
meant simply that and nothing more; and 
Flora’s efforts could not draw him into any 
continuous conversation. 

When they reached the church door, 
Warren paused on the steps: 

“ I’ll come around by the time the meet- 
ing is over. It lasts about an hour, doesn’t 
it?” 

‘‘ Oh, I thought you were coming in with 
us! Won’t you? Please do. Cousin War- 
ren.” 

But the persuasive tone was lost. 

“ No, thank you. I have some errands at 
the stores, but I will be here in time to go 
home with you.” 

I wish he had come in,” whispered Flora, 
regretfully, as he turned away. 

Unity did not know whether she wished it 


164 


UNITY DODOE. 


or not ; she was not yet quite sure that she 
wished to be there herself. It was all new 
to her. The rather dim light that had 
attracted a circle of buzzing insects, and the 
thin congregation scattered in small groups 
through the room, were not very inspiriting. 
She glanced at the gray-haired minister, of 
whom she had always stood in awe, and then 
at the large Bible on the desk before him. 
What if he should read some of those 
prophecies which always troubled her, and 
should interpret them as her father did? 

But nothing of the kind happened. In 
trembling, earnest tones he slowly read a 
chapter of peace and trust — “One of Flo- 
ra’s chapters,” the reassured listener whispered 
to herself. The hymn that followed breathed 
the same spirit ; and if the prayers offered by 
one and another were rambling and ungram- 
matical, and in one or two instances painfully 
slow and halting, they at least sounded sin- 
cere. Unity wondered how it all seemed to 
Flora, and stole a glance at the fair face 
beside her. It was grave and attentive, as 
if she really were enjoying the services, 
though, of course, it must be very different 


THE PATTERN FROM TOWN. 


165 


from those at home for which she cared so 
much, Unity reasoned. 

Presently, in a brief pause that no one 
appeared quite ready to fill. Unity was 
startled to hear the clear voice beside her 
repeat with lingering emphasis a precious 
promise : 

“‘Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace 
whose mind is stayed on thee, because he 
trusteth in thee.’ ” 

No other words spoken that evening 
thrilled Unity as did those, yet how could 
Flora have dared to utter them there ? But 
she had done it as simply as if it were the 
most natural thing in the world. Unity 
sighed. She wished she could attain that 
“ perfect peace she wished more frequently 
than ever that she could be like Flora as she 
heard the sweet, unfaltering tones in the 
closing hymn : 

“ His oath, his covenant and blood 
Support me in the whelming flood ; 

When all around my soul gives way, 

His truth is then my shield and stay.” 

Warren was waiting for them near the 
door when they passed out. His sister 


166 


UNITY DODGE. 


wondered how long he had been there — 
whether he had but just entered or had 
been there for a part of the service ? But 
no word of his on the homeward way en- 
lightened her. One could almost have 
imagined that he exerted himself to talk 
more than usual for the express purpose 
of turning the conversation away from the 
meeting. 

In any case, the subject was not mentioned 
until the two girls were in their own room, 
and then Flora said, 

“ I wish you could go to one of our meet- 
ings at home, Una, and into our Sunday- 
school. There are so many things I want 
you to see and learn! We really must in 
some way so manage that I can have you for 
a good long visit this winter.” 


CHAPTER yill. 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 

E ven Flora’s managing could not bring 
about a visit to the city the next winter. 
Unity, who had never in her life spent a 
week from home, did not expect anything 
of the kind, and was not disappointed ; but 
Flora’s regretful letters came frequently. 

Warren had fulfilled his purpose of going 
to Waynesdale, and, with both boys away, 
the daily life in the old farmhouse seemed 
strangely changed. Until she missed it she 
had not known that Warren’s usually silent 
presence was so much to her ; then, looking 
backward, she saw that during the past year 
she had unconsciously drawn nearer to him, 
and she recalled countless trifling incidents 
that had shown his interest in her. If she 
had been like Flora, what might she not 
have done for him and for Reub — ‘‘Poor 
Reub!” she thought, with a sigh. 


167 


168 


UNITY DODGE. 


A new boy had come to the house, how- 
ever, a very small one, and entirely useless 
so far as farm-work was concerned ; but 
John uttered no complaints on that account, 
and seemed greatly delighted with the ac- 
quisition, praising him most heartily when 
he spent the greatest number of hours in 
luxurious indolence in his cradle. 

Dr. Dodge bestowed upon his grandson a 
scrutiny at once curious and pathetic : 

‘‘ He’s a fine fellow, John, but he does not 
know what sort of a world he has come into. 
It doesn’t seem but a little while since — 
Ah ! Well, well !” With a sigh the doctor 
broke off his retrospect and returned to his 
books. 

A child in the house was a treasure to 
Unity, yet a somewhat costly treasure in 
the tax it laid upon her time and strength, 
making the busy days still busier and using 
up the few leisure-hours she had before 
called her own. Love for the little one and 
her new desire to do faithfully whatever her 
hand found to do wrought willing service 
even beyond the strength of the slender 
form, and the young girl was forced to 


A VISIT TO FLOBA. 


169 


acknowledge to herself that she felt sadly 
wearied and languid when spring came. 

Warren was the first to notice it on one 
of those occasional visits home which Rhoda 
secretly questioned why he paid, and which 
even Unity sometimes wondered over. He 
did not seem either to bring or to seek much 
information. He looked in on his father, 
watched Unity, noted changes on the farm 
and about the house with a kind of quiet 
interest, but without much comment, stayed 
a day and went away. 

‘‘ It always seems as if he didn’t care 
particularly for anybody — as if he came for 
nothing special and went away for the same 
reason,” said Hhoda. 

One morning Unity was carrying the fret- 
ting baby to and fro with slow steps when 
her brother abruptly turned to her: 

“ Why don’t you sit down with that child ? 
See here, Una! playing nursemaid for that 
little fellow is all right so far as you like it, 
but you mustn’t fancy there is any need for 
your doing it when you’re not able. That 
is no duty to yourself or to anybody else. 
John and Rhoda can afford to hire more 


170 


UNITY DODGE. 


help if it is wanted ; I know the farm is 
paying well enough for that.” 

‘‘ Oh, but Rhoda would — ” “ Never con- 

sent to such a thing,” she had been about to 
say; but she wisely changed the sentence 
into “would not be willing to trust Baby 
with every one. Besides, I like to take care 
of him,” she added ; “ only I am so tired 
lately. I think it is these spring mornings 
that have made me feel so.” 

“Why don’t you go and see Flora?” 
Warren suddenly demanded. “ Isn’t she 
always writing to have you come?” 

“Yes, but I can’t go. I’ve never really 
thought of it,” she said, in astonishment. 
“Why, Warren, how could I?” 

“Why couldn’t you?” he replied, half 
impatiently. “You are made of the same 
material as other girls and put into the same 
world, but it seems to me they have and do 
a great many things that are always called 
impossible for you.” Then he walked away, 
leaving her bewildered and with no answer 
ready even if he had waited for one. 

Una thought he must afterward have 
spoken to his father about it. And then. 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


171 


a little later, came another letter from Flora, 
this time addressed to Dr. Dodge himself 
and urging that her cousin should be allowed 
to pay her a visit. 

Exactly how so wonderful an event was 
brought about Unity could scarcely under- 
stand, but at the dinner-table her father 
mentioned the letter he had received, and 
added, in his slow, half-abstracted way, 

“ Perhaps it is best for her to go. They 
are her relatives. Yes, she’d better go.” 

After the first moment of astonishment 
John glanced doubtfully at Phoda and 
began to demur. He did not know about 
that. Spring was a pretty busy season, and 
it would be hard for Phoda to manage alone. 
Flora had been there only the summer be- 
fore, and it was not likely Unity cared much 
about seeing her again so soon. That sort 
of a visit would be expensive, too. 

But Dr. Dodge looked at him with the 
same absent gaze, and without seeming to 
have heard a word he had uttered proceeded 
meditatively, as if trying to recall a partially 
forgotten train of thought : 

“ As Warren says, she has some right in 


172 


UNITY DODGE. 


the property and its — its profits. I do not 
see that it matters much in days like these — 
very little ; but it may be better for her to 
go. A trip once in a while — I suppose she 
has not traveled much lately.” 

As Unity had never journeyed farther 
from home than the neighboring town of 
Waynesdale, the supposition was so absurdly 
correct that it brought a faint smile even to 
Rhoda’s face, which had worn an extremely 
dissatisfied expression since the conversation 
began. 

“I think Warren is troubling himself a 
good deal about things that don’t concern 
him,” commented Mrs. John, briefiy, when 
dinner was over. 

But soon thereafter it happened that her 
sister arrived for one of her periodical visits, 
thereby providing Bhoda with both company 
and help; and so, though Unity scarcely 
knew how it all came about, she one day 
found herself in the cars, actually on her 
way to visit Flora. She glanced down at 
her new traveling-dress and satchel for con- 
firmation when John and the long platform 
at the village station had vanished from 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


173 


sight. That she had but a few hours’ ride 
before her, with no occasion to change cars, 
freed her from all anxiety, and she nestled 
comfortably back in her seat to enjoy the 
beautiful panorama unfolding before her, 
and to indulge in more brilliant day-dreams 
than were common to her; for, after this 
marvelous expedition, few things seemed 
impossible. 

Lester was awaiting her on her arrival, 
and at once he led the way to a carriage. 

“ No, Flora is not here,” he said, noticing 
her quick, expectant look. She had to go 
to a meeting of some sort, and so sent me to 
meet you. She said she would be at home 
as early as possible, which means when the 
meeting is ended. You needn’t feel hurt 
about it,” he continued, with another of 
those quick glances at her face. “If Flo 
had a Dorcas society on hand, she wouldn’t 
come to meet the queen of Sheba.” 

“ Flora does so much !” Unity remarked, 
admiringly, her momentary disappointment 
vanishing in appreciation of her cousin’s 
many talents and the demand there must 
be for their exercise. 


174 


UNITY DODGE. 


Lester twisted his face into an indescribable 
expression and shrugged his shoulders : 

‘‘I’m glad I’m not so fearfully useful. 
There are a few things in this world that 
I think will get along without my attend- 
ing to them. Mother shakes her head over 
me, but I really believe it is a consolation 
to her sometimes that I haven’t undertaken 
to run all creation. I do not feel obliged 
to get up in time to see that the sun rises 
properly, and I am fully convinced that it 
can set without the formation of a society, 
with president, vice-president and secretary, 
to attend to it.” 

This was still the same Lester, only two 
years older and but little changed except 
in the matter of inches, Unity thought. 
She laughed: 

“ You cannot make me believe that Flora 
is busying herself with all manner of useless 
undertakings.” 

“ Oh, they are useful, of course — very,” 
with another wry face. “Only it strikes 
an ignorant mind that if one wants to give 
a sixpence to a beggar it would be the most 
sensible way just to give it, instead of organ- 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


175 


izing a society with constitution and by-laws 
to hold six meetings a month and listen to 
the report of sixteen committees on the con- 
dition of paupers in Europe and the advis- 
ableness of giving a concert to aid this par- 
ticular one in America. It is beautiful and 
systematic, and all that; but the beggar 
may possibly die before he gets the six- 
pence. Now, there is that great moral-re- 
form movement for the suppression of chew- 
ing-gum among small boys — ” 

“ Lester ! what nonsense interrupted Uni- 
ty, amused but puzzled. 

“ Well, perhaps that isn’t the object. If 
you think it’s so absurd, of course I must 
be laboring under a mistake,” admitted 
Lester, with an injured air. ‘‘ But, really, 
there are so many reforms of the utmost 
importance in their effect upon the rising 
generation, as the lecturers say, that it isn’t 
much wonder a fellow gets them a little 
crooked now and then.” 

Unity laughed, though she was half vexed 
with herself for laughing at what she felt to 
be ridicule of some of those great enter- 
prises of which Flora had spoken with such 


176 


UNITY DODGE. 


glowing enthusiasm. She wondered that his 
sister’s kindling eyes and persuasive voice had 
not won Lester to greater sympathy with those 
things than he apparently possessed. Still, he 
might feel more than he manifested. But she 
had little time to ponder the subject, for he 
began to ask questions about the farm and 
the old house and its inmates, and before 
they were fairly answered the carriage 
stopped. 

‘‘Here we are,” said Lester, leading the 
way up a flight of stone steps and into a 
softly carpeted but dark hall. He pushed 
open a door, and in another moment Unity 
found herself in the room beyond, receiving 
the greeting of the aunt whom she had never 
seen : 

“And this is Una ? My dear child, I am 
glad to see you. I am so sorry Flora couldn’t 
be here this afternoon ! but she felt obliged to 
go to the meeting. And then I was afraid 
Lester would miss you in some way.” 

“Lester misses very few things that he 
cares to And,” observed that young gentle- 
man, with a deeper truthfulness than his 
mother perceived. 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


177 


“ Lay off your wraps, my dear. Or would 
you rather go directly to your room without 
waiting for Flora? The wind is cool to-day: 
I hope you haven’t taken cold in the cars,” 
pursued Mrs. Dodge. She was a small, 
delicate, fair-faced woman with little anxious 
lines between her eyes — a face that bore the 
trace of no great sorrow, but of innumerable 
small worries, ‘‘ to which,” as Lester once 
saucily declared, ‘‘ she devoted her mind.” 

“ Don’t own it in any case,” he hastened 
to warn Unity. “ Mother is always uneasy 
until she can find that we have taken cold 
in some way, and then more uneasy still 
until she has prepared horrible doses to cure 
it.” 

“Now, Lester, you shouldn’t run on so. 
That fashion of exaggerating is growing to 
be a bad habit with you,” expostulated his 
mother. But as he walked away with a 
careless laugh to give directions concerning 
Unity’s trunk, she looked after him with a 
fond smile. “He is the very light of the 
house, with his gay spirits,” she declared ; 
but immediately added, with a faint sigh, 
“ Still, I am often anxious about him, dear 


12 


178 


UNITY DODGE. 


boy ! If he were only a little more serious 
about some things !” 

Mrs. Dodge was very kind to her niece 
— almost oppressively so, it seemed to Unity, 
who was accustomed to no such careful so- 
licitude. She answered the many inquiries 
concerning her family and her journey, but 
she was relieved when, an hour later, she 
heard Flora’s voice in the hall and her quick 
step approaching. 

“ Darling Una, you really are here at 
last!” she exclaimed, with a kiss and an 
embrace. ‘‘ Did you think I was rude and 
unkind, and dreadful generally, because I 
wasn’t at home to meet you ?” The last 
vestige of such a feeling vanished before 
the warmth of her welcome, and Unity was 
ashamed of having entertained the faintest 
trace of it as her cousin proceeded : “ It was 
too bad, dear, and I was sorry, but it was a 
meeting I could not very well neglect — in 
the interest of one of our mission schools — 
and I knew I could trust to your unselfish- 
ness where anything of that kind was at 
stake.” 

“ Stake ’? Yes,” drawled Lester, mis- 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


179 


chievously. ‘‘You'd better explain, Flo, 
what a beautiful work of benevolence it is 
that induces a dozen young ladies to travel to 
the outskirts of the city and meet a troop of 
boys from respectable families who are regu- 
larly schooled — or Sunday-schooled — every 
day of the week. The ladies amuse them- 
selves with the idea that they are doing 
mission work — gathering in the highways 
and hedges — while the youngsters go for 
the fun of the thing, ready to swallow a 
little more school because of the extra 
inducements offered in the way of stories, 
presents and festivals. It is a great work. 
Almost any good-natured boy can afford 
to play heathen once a week for the sake of 
pleasing the young ladies, you know, having 
a good time and a pocket full of candy now 
and then." 

“ Will you come up stairs, Una ? I am 
so glad to have you here!" 

There was a slight flush on Flora's cheek, 
but, aside from that, she did not seem to 
notice her brother's remark as she put her 
arm around Unity and led her away. What 
a beautiful room Flora's was, with its softly- 


180 


VNITY DODOE. 


blending tints of carpet and curtains, its 
dainty matching of cushions and lambre- 
quins! Unity’s wondering, delighted eyes 
noted it all — the pictures, the perfect toilet 
appointments, the sunny window with its 
flowers, the cozy chairs inviting rest. It 
was the flrst really handsome room she had 
ever seen. Then she glanced at Flora and 
thought how in harmony she seemed with 
all her surroundings, and her second thought 
was impulsively outspoken : 

“ Flora, I wonder how you ever cared for 
me, or why you want me ? Your life 
doesn’t need me ; I am not like — this.” 

“ You are like yourself, and that is better. 
Perhaps I care for you all the more because 
you are not like everything and everybody 
else around me,” Flora answered, without 
taking the trouble to analyze — she seldom 
did that — the reason for her liking. Her 
low, pleasant laugh accompanied the words, 
but that slight flush was still on her cheeks, 
and in a moment she came closer to Unity 
and laid a hand on her shoulder: ‘‘Dear, 
you must not mind what Lester says ; you 
must not let him prejudice you. I may as 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


181 


well tell you, since you will be sure to see it, 
that in many ways he is not in sympathy 
with me.” 

It was strange that the fair face, the win- 
ning voice and manner that were so potent 
with others, should be powerless with this 
only brother. Unity thought; and something 
of her wonder must have found expression 
in her eyes, for Flora saw and hastened to 
answer it : 

“Yes, I know, Una. I suppose it must 
appear very strange to you, but really Lester 
has such a fashion of ridiculing subjects — 
projects rather — that are almost sacred to 
me that I think the best way to avoid such 
irreverent trifling is seldom to speak of such 
things before him. He has been greatly 
indulged too. I think mamma is wrong in 
allowing it ; she ought to interfere more 
than she does.” 

Both tone and words surprised Unity, but 
it was Flora’s low voice that was speaking 
and Flora’s sweet face, somewhat clouded 
now, that was looking into hers, so it must 
be right some way; there must be a good 
reason. She was sure of it the next moment. 


182 


UNITY DODGE. 


and fully sympathetic when her cousin added 
with a little sigh : 

“So, you see, Una, my path is not all 
sunshine/’ 

But the sunshine was back again presently 
as they talked of other matters, exchanging 
various items of intelligence and interest that 
had not found their way into letters; and 
when the conversation came gradually and 
naturally back to Flora’s many occupations, 
she was ready to explain candidly : 

“ I do not mean to say there was no truth 
in what Lester said of that school, but it 
was truth sadly exaggerated and caricatured. 
The fact is the school was established away 
out there for the purpose of drawing in a 
host of little vagabonds who are not regu- 
larly taught anywhere, but a good many 
boys from up-town schools heard about it 
and go out there too, because they want 
something to do, I suppose, and — Well, as 
Lester says, there are inducements held out, 
and it is vexatious that they bring in more 
of the class we do not want than of the class 
we do want. But you can very easily see 
that a work may be good even though at- 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


183 


tending it there are some evils that we have 
not yet been able to remedy.” 

Unity had completed her toilet with the 
consciousness, not quite comfortable, that her 
cousin’s eyes noted every detail, though try- 
ing to betray no token of doing so. Of 
course the articles packed in that modest 
trunk were very unlike the rich, soft text- 
ures that were revealed for a moment when 
Flora’s closet doors were thrown carelessly 
open. But Flora did not really care much 
for such things — at least, she did not value 
any one more or less because of them. Unity 
had reassured herself with that thought be- 
fore she left home, and she repeated its con- 
solation now as she announced her readiness 
to descend. 

“ There will be no one but ourselves here 
this evening,” said Flora, whether in answer 
to some reflection of her own or to some- 
thing she saw in Unity’s face was not appar- 
ent — ‘‘at least, I hope there will be no one 
else: we want you all to ourselves for one 
evening.” 

The family circle for the time numbered 
but the three members, as Mr. Dodge was in 


184 


UNITY DODGE. 


Europe. Flora had urged his absence and 
their loneliness as a strong plea for her 
cousin’s visit, though her father’s business 
so frequently called him from home that 
they had all grown accustomed to, if not 
satisfied with, it. 

That first evening was a delightful one to 
Unity, and long before it ended she decided 
that if any clouds existed in Flora’s sky they 
were neither large nor dark. Lester was in 
the best of spirits, as bright, entertaining 
and agreeable as only Lester could be, while 
his sister seemed quite her sweet, untroubled 
self again. The flute and the piano dis- 
coursed in harmony, and the anxious lines 
were smoothed away from Mrs. Dodge’s 
forehead as she listened, smiled and suggest- 
ed new favorites — a gentle, motherly presence 
that awoke in Unity’s heart, as she glanced 
at her cousin, a faint refrain of the old cry 
of her childhood : ‘‘I’m not like other girls, 
’cause I haven’t any mother.” 

Mrs. Dodge had insisted upon seating her 
in a large easy-chair where she could “ rest 
while she listened,” and still pressed upon 
her the watchful attentions that had seemed 


A VISIT TO FLORA. 


185 


almost burdensome in the afternoon, but 
grew more natural now as Unity saw how 
tirelessly her aunt bestowed them upon her 
own children. Some words from an old 
poem flashed through the girl’s mind their 
sweet explanation — 

“ How that small fretting fretfulness 
Was but love’s over-anxiousness, 

Which had not been had love been less.” 


Music, books and magazines, and then 
a long pleasant talk, filled the hours full. 

Lester’s one teasing remark was reserved 
for the close : 

“ Haven’t I been almost as good as a mis- 
sion-school boy, Flo ?” 

But Flora only laughed good-naturedly : 

I mean to take Una to see my schools 
and classes, and then she can decide for 
herself how you compare with the other 
urchins.” 

“ Poor Una !” sighed Lester, commiserat- 
ingly, as he bade them good-night. And 
then he looked back to add : ‘‘ Before you 
decide fully in favor of the ‘ other urchins,’ 
Una, you must remember that Miss Dodge 


186 


UNITY DODGE. 


doesn’t bestow so much care upon me as she 
does upon them. I do pretty well, consider- 
ing my disadvantages.” 

As the two girls read their evening chap- 
ter together in their room that night Flora’s 
finger pointed to one verse : 

‘‘ Blessed are they which are persecuted 
for righteousness’ sake.” 

“ I suppose,” said Unity, after a moment’s 
silent wondering why Flora should notice 
that verse particularly, ‘Uhat must have 
been a great comfort to the martyrs in the 
olden times, and to people now who really 
do suffer for Christ’s sake ; but it doesn’t 
seem to mean so much to us in these days.” 

“Do you think so?” questioned Flora, 
slowly. “ There are so many kinds of per- 
secution, Una ! We are not confronted by 
stake, fagots or dungeons, of course, but it 
sometimes seems as if hindrances, reproaches 
and ridicule were almost as hard for a sensi- 
tive spirit to meet. No, I do not believe 
those words were altogether intended for 
old times or for other countries.” 

Unity understood then, but there fiashed 
upon her thought a memory of St. Paul — 


A VISIT TO FLOEA. 


187 


‘‘ in labors more abundant, in stripes above 
measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths 
oft. In weariness and painfulness, in watch- 
ings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings 
often, in cold and nakedness,” yet saying 
steadfastly, ‘^None of these things move me.” 
The beautiful room before her was a sharp 
contrast to that mental picture, and the dainty 
silken-robed figure by her side looked, even 
to her loving, sympathetic eyes, a very com- 
fortable martyr. ^ 


CHAPTER IX. 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET -PARADE. 

“T OOP this lace at your throat; it just 
suits that dark dress,” suggested Flora, 
one morning, substituting a filmy scarf of 
her own for the ribbon Una had taken up. 

They were dressing to go out, and this 
remark was merely a parenthesis, for Flora 
was busily talking of other things. She had 
made several such suggestions and changes 
during the course of the toilet — made them 
so quietly and naturally that she scarcely 
seemed to bestow a thought upon them her- 
self. But through all the conversation Unity 
felt that her cousin’s eyes noted every detail 
of her dress, and she began to be nervous 
and uneasy over every article. Still, there 
was neither scrutiny nor criticism to which 
she could object. She felt rather than saw 
it, but her face flushed slightly when Flora 
stayed her hand as she was reaching for her 
188 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET- PARADE. 189 

hat and placed a pretty brown turban on her 
head instead : 

‘‘ That just suits your face, Una ; and how 
beautifully it matches your dress!” Then 
as she caught Una’s eyes she paused sud- 
denly at something she read there : ‘‘ I beg 
your pardon, my dear. Perhaps you don’t 
like my playing dressing-maid ? I always 
did wish I had a younger sister to dress up, 
study effects for and fuss over as I pleased, 
and here I am making one of you without 
stopping to ask your leave. Don’t wear the 
hat, of course, if you don’t like it. It is 
very possible the younger sister might have 
an opinion of her own, after all.” 

Which explanation, uttered laughingly, 
made the whole matter seem too trivial to 
be worth an objection — too kind to deserve 
one; and Unity answered sincerely: 

‘‘I think the young lady might safely 
trust to your taste.” 

And she wore the brown turban, though 
still feeling a little uncomfortable as they 
passed out into the street. She wished it 
had not happened on Sunday, when she 
wanted her mind free from vexing thoughts; 


190 


UNITY DODGE. 


but she had her wish, for the trifling annoy- 
ance was wholly forgotten, a little later, when 
she found herself in the large Sunday-school 
room. 

“I will introduce you to some of the 
teachers and find a place for you in one 
of the Bible classes; or you can go with 
me if you wish ?” Flora had paused a 
moment in the vestibule to whisper inter- 
rogatively. 

“ ril go with you if 3’^ou don’t mind,” 
Una answered, hurriedly ; and they entered 
the spacious, well-lighted, pleasant room. 

The whole scene was new to Unity — very 
different from the school in the little village 
church at home, though even that she had 
so seldom attended that it was unfamiliar. 
She followed Flora to her class, watched her 
greet some of her girls as they entered, while 
books were rapidly but quietly distributed, 
and then the single clear note of a bell 
called the occupants of the room to order. 
The few words of thanksgiving and peti- 
tion, followed by the many voices slowly 
repeating the Lord’s Prayer in unison, and 
then the music of the hymn — 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 191 


“ Turning swift at thy sweet summons, 
Evermore, 0 Christ, would we, 

For thy love all else forsaking, 
Follow, follow thee” — 


thrilled her strangely. Her eyes filled with 
tears, and she could scarcely see to find the 
chapter to which all about her turned so 
readily for the responsive reading. An- 
other hymn followed, and then sliding- 
doors were noiselessly closed, giving the in- 
fant-class an apartment by themselves, while 
in the larger outer room the teachers turned 
to their classes with the promptness of those 
who have no minutes to waste. Collection 
envelopes and attendance cards were expe- 
ditiously passed and marked, and the lessons 
began. How many busy workers there were 
— superintendent, assistants, teachers, librari- 
ans, secretary — performing so many different 
ofiices, yet each seemingly filling so naturally 
the appointed place ! How beautiful and won- 
derful it all was ! 

Unity glanced from one to another of the 
groups about her before her attention finally 
centred upon Flora and her class and she 
grew interested in the lesson itself. A 


192 


UNITY DODGE. 


circle of half-grown girls, bright, eager, 
full of restless longings and almost impa- 
tient wonderings, striving to read the mean- 
ing of all the life within them and around 
them, how daringly they questioned ! It 
was not at all after the fashion of the in- 
structive conversations’’ in good books — of 
which Unity had read a few — and she lis- 
tened wonderingly. 

‘‘ ‘Always to pray and not to faint.’ Miss 
Dodge, what does that mean ?” 

“ It means, I think, that sometimes we pray 
for things — we so often do — and they don’t 
come, and then are to keep on having 
faith just the same.” 

“And then,” added another, “ when we 
pray for things and they do come, we some- 
times say to ourselves, ‘ I’m not sure it is an 
answer, after all ; maybe it would have come, 
any way.’ ” 

“ Besides,” suggested a slower voice, “ we 
often want things — want them oh so much ! 
— when we are not at all sure that God will 
think it best for us to have them. Then 
how can we pray in faith ? or oughtn’t we 
to pray for such things at all?” 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 193 

Gently, patiently, the teacher took up the 
tangles, straightening and smoothing them 
out as simply and clearly as she was able, 
tender with the crude imaginings and per- 
plexities and welcoming the real inquiry 
for the truth, however worded. She spoke 
of the love for the Father in heaven, of his 
care for the little things that make up daily 
happiness, as well as for the greater things 
that concern the spirit’s holiness ; of how 
confidently they might carry every desire, 
every request, to him, if only they were 
willing to trust to his knowing better than 
themselves what was really best. 

“ Because, you see, girls, he is our Father, 
too loving and good, if we ask a stone think- 
ing it is bread, to mock us by giving exactly 
what we ask for. Why, look back over your 
own prayers. You are young, yet can you 
not nearly all remember asking for things 
which now you can see would have been the 
very reverse of blessings if God had granted 
them ?” 

One and another bright head nodded 
assent to this question. The circle had 
clustered closer around their teacher jn the 

13 


194 


VNITY DODGE. 


interest of the conversation, and the faces 
wore a softer, more reverent look, while 
Flora’s was all aglow with her subject. 
How fair, sweet and earnest she was ! Unity 
watched her wistfully with a throb of pain 
at her heart. Not jealousy or envy : Flora 
deserved all that was hers, love whispered 
loyally ; but it would be so pleasant to 
have some part in all this noble work, and 
it seemed so far removed from her own 
life. 

Another touch of the bell, quick, impera- 
tive, and the lesson hour was over. Unity 
sympathized with the half-petulant remark 
of one of the girls: 

“That bell always rings too soon.” 

“ Well, how did you like our school ?” 
questioned Flora on their homeward way. 

“ ‘ Like it ’ ? Oh, Flora, how good and 
beautiful it all is!” Unity exclaimed, with 
that wistful pain still in her voice. “ I wish 
I could have some share in such work.” 

“And can you not, dear? Wait until 
you go home again, and you will find new 
ways and plans for work opening before 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 195 

you — not just the same work, perhaps, but 
equally good and useful,’’ said Flora, hope- 
fully. “ It is only because — ” 

Two shabbily-dressed children playing on 
the street attracted her attention, and she 
broke off her sentence abruptly to speak to 
them : 

Good-morning, boys. This is a nice 
day, isn’t it? Have you been to Sunday- 
school anywhere?” 

After a prolonged stare the older of the 
two replied : 

‘‘We don’t b’long.” 

“ Don’t you ? That is too bad,” said 
Flora’s kindliest tones. “I should think 
you would like to go to one. They have 
such nice music and books and papers. 
Here are two of the papers, and two pretty 
cards. You may take them home and read 
the stories. You can read, can’t you?” 

A rather dubious nod of the head an- 
swered, and after another wondering stare, 
first at the papers and then at their giver, 
one of the boys volunteered the informa- 
tion : 

“Mother can’t keep us in clothes to go 


196 


UNITY DODGE. 


to school, nor nothin’ ; and, ary way, she’s 
sick now.” 

‘‘Is she? Where do you live?” 

Flora’s ready note-book received name, 
street and number, and after a few more 
questions she and her cousin passed on. 

“ I should never have thought of that,” 
said Unity, soberly. “ I should have passed 
such children without a thought of stopping 
to speak to them.” 

“ But you will think after this,” smiled 
Flora. “And one reason why you would 
not have thought at once, I suppose, is be- 
cause you so seldom meet such cases at home. 
I must hunt up these people to-morrow and 
learn who and what they are.” 

Both girls were busied in Mrs. Dodge’s 
room the next morning, assisting her in 
assorting collars and laces and packing her 
trunk preparatory to a two weeks’ absence — 
a visit which it had been arranged she 
should make while Unity could remain 
with Flora. 

“ Usually mamma fancies that she cannot 
leave home, but there isn’t a bit of reason 
why she should not go now, while I have 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 197 

you for company and to help me keep 
house,” said Flora ; and Unity smiled ac- 
quiescence, though privately of the opinion 
that any housekeeping Flora might under- 
take would not be very arduous. 

“You know very little about it, child,” 
sighed Mrs. Dodge, with the little anxious 
lines drawing her brows together. “ There 
are a hundred things that may happen.” 

“And that may not happen,” laughed 
Flora. “Now, mamma dear, don’t worry, 
but have a real pleasant visit for once.” 

Nevertheless, with all the possibilities and 
peradventures in her mind, she had so many 
arrangements to make, so many directions 
and messages to leave, so many precautions 
to take, that both Flora and Una had a busy 
morning in their capacity of assistants, and 
not until the early dinner was over and the 
carriage had rolled away toward the station 
did they find themselves free. 

“ Dear me ! It is always equal to launch- 
ing a ship,” cried Flora, in a tone at which 
Unity laughed, though she wondered at it a 
little also. But her cousin instantly added : 
“ Lester will see her safely provided with 


198 


UNITY DODGE. 


tickets and a seat, so we can feel comfortable 
about her, and I do hope she will enjoy the 
trip. Shall we dress and go out to hunt up 
the ‘ local habitation ’ of my two little vag- 
abonds 

The walk proved a long one, but the 
afternoon was pleasant, and a view of the 
lower parts of the city, where their walks 
and drives seldom took them, interested 
Unity. They had no difficulty in finding 
the place they sought, and the visit, the 
family, the story Flora’s kindly inquiries 
elicited, occupied the minds of both as they 
walked slowly homeward talking it over, 
until a sudden vision completely banished 
it from Unity’s thought. They had turned 
into a wider street, when they found them- 
selves unexpectedly in the midst of a crowd 
who were pushing and jostling on the side- 
walk. A band of music sounded near at 
hand, and a moment later a motley proces- 
sion appeared marching slowly down the road 
— a number of horses and elephants, some 
gayly-painted dusty cages, two or three 
chariots of tarnished gilt — followed by a 
troop of small boys. 







The recognition of the strayed brother. Page 199, 



ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 199 

‘‘ That’s the circus that was to have come 
in this morning, but the train was off time ; 
so it’s only just got here,” explained one of 
the latter personages for the benefit of his 
companions. “ It’s a-goin’ to show out by 
Styles’s lot to-night.” 

Flora drew her cousin into a deep-arched 
doorway to let the crowd pass ; but, as the 
procession wound slowly by, among the 
riders, in their tawdry uniforms. Unity saw 
a face that she recognized at the first swift 
glance. 

‘‘ Oh, E-eub!” she cried, involuntarily. 

The young man turned quickly at the 
name, half drew rein, and then, with a slight 
motion of his hand that might or might not 
have meant recognition, rode on. 

Other heads turned also at that quick call, 
but few except Flora really knew who had 
uttered it, and even she did not understand 
it. She looked at her cousin wonderingly, 
a little mortified, too, by the attention so 
suddenly attracted to them, but her low 
“ Why, Una !” restrained the girl’s impulsive 
movement to spring forward and recalled 
her to herself. In a moment or two the 


200 


UNITY DODGE. 


crowd swept on in pursuit of the pageant, 
and Unity, who had strained her gaze as 
long as the horses were in sight, turned 
again to her companion with a long, troubled 
breath : 

Oh, Flora, that was my brother Reub ! 
How can I let him go on so ?” 

“Your brother who ran away?” questioned 
Flora. 

“ Yes ; and I have never seen him, never 
heard from him, since, except to know that 
he had joined some such company as this. 
Father disowned him, you know, and for- 
bade our even so much as mentioning his 
name again.” 

“ It is very hard for you, dear, but Uncle 
Dodge is right, of course. You cannot coun- 
tenance him in any such dreadful life.” The 
ready tears came to Flora’s beautiful eyes as 
she spoke, and after a moment she added 
softly : “ I can understand how you must 
feel, Una, but still you must try to look at 
it differently. You could not help it. You 
are not to blame for his conduct, and so it is 
no real disgrace to you.” 

“ I was not thinking of that — of myself : 


ONE FACE IN THE STBEET-PABABE. 201 

I was only thinking of poor Eeub,” answered 
Unity, simply ; and they walked homeward 
in silence. 

For Unity could not help thinking of 
Eeuben. She fancied that he had not 
looked particularly happy, well cared for 
or well satisfied, and she was not ready to 
accept with Flora’s quiet ‘‘of course” the 
proposition that it was best to have nothing 
to do with him. Her father had indeed cast 
him off, and had forbidden the others to 
mention his name. He had not forbidden 
them to hold communication with him. 
Perhaps he had intended that, perhaps he 
had not thought of it ; but, in any case, the 
right and the wrong of the matter did not 
appear so clear to her as seemingly it did 
to her cousin. She could not shake off the 
feeling, grown strong of late, that Reuben 
might have been different if there had been 
some one to help him — if she herself had 
been older, wiser and more loving. Almost 
it seemed as if she owed to poor Eeub a debt 
from those old days. And what prospect was 
there of his leaving this “dreadful life,” as 
Flora had called it, while he believed that 


202 


UNITY DODGE. 


his whole family had disowned him and 
that he had neither home nor friends ? 

Unity slipped up stairs that afternoon to 
ponder the subject alone, but all her efforts 
at untangling the vexed questions did not 
settle them very clearly, and it was a some- 
what troubled face that joined Flora and 
Lester at the tea-table. 

“Are you too tired to go out with me this 
evening asked Flora as the three retired 
to the parlor. “There is a committee meet- 
ing to-night, and Miss May will call for me 
in half an hour.” 

“I am not tired,” admitted Unity, hon- 
estly, “but — ” 

“ Committee discussions are not very in- 
teresting to those not concerned?” laughed 
Flora, noticing her hesitation. “ I will leave 
you with Lester, then, and he must see that 
you have a pleasant evening.” 

“ Command my resources to the whole of 
my kingdom,” answered Lester, lazily, but 
looking pleased. “I thought you must be 
made of heroic stuff if you could stand 
many of Flo’s committee sieges.” 

Flora ran to her room for shawl and hat. 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET- PARADE. 203 

and, the door-bell ringing as she came down, 
only looked into the parlor for a moment to 
wish them “Good-night’’ and a pleasant 
time. 

“ Now, what shall it be ?” asked Lester, 
when they were left alone. “ Will you go 
out for a ride? or would you like a con- 
cert — there is a good one — or a lecture? 
Or,” mischievously, “I suppose I might 
find a meeting somewhere if nothing else 
will satisfy you.” 

“ I believe,” said Unity, hesitatingly, 
“ that I should prefer — the circus.” 

“ ‘ The circus’ !” Lester looked at her for 
one instant in amazement, then threw his 
head back against the sofa and laughed. 
“ Country and first principles will out, spite 
of everything. If Flo could only have heard 
you say that ! Handel concerts and lyceum 
lectures are nothing to a circus ! My dear 
coz, you shall go if I can find your favorite 
entertainment in the city limits.” 

“ It isn’t my favorite amusement,” laughed 
Unity, but with the troubled look instantly 
coming back to her face. “And it isn’t a 
return to first principles, either; for you 


204 


UNITY DODGE. 


ought to know my father well enough to be 
sure that I have never been to such a place 
in my life. But — Oh, Lester, it is about 
Keub f and she told the story of the after- 
noon’s encounter. “ I do not know what to 
do — what I ought to do,” she concluded — 
‘‘ but I feel as if I must see him again, and 
I do not know how to manage it in any 
other way.” 

Lester had grown grave at once, and lis- 
tened to her story in silence. Borne way, 
she found it easier to speak to him about it 
than it had been when she had spoken to his 
sister upon the same subject. 

“ Would it do for me to go alone ?” he 
asked, but immediately answered his own 
question : “ No, I suppose not. Beub never 
knew me very well — never liked me at all; 
and he wouldn’t listen to me. I hardly see 
how you can find a chance to speak to him, 
but we will try it. Bun and get ready as 
soon as you can ; we haven’t much time to 
spare.” 

‘‘ Do you think I am wrong ?” asked 
Unity, anxiously, as they hastened down 
the street. ‘‘ I am afraid Flora would think 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET PARADE. 205 

SO. She said something to-day about con- 
sidering my father’s wishes, and that he was 
right of course.” 

“ Oh, I won’t pretend to dispute the wis- 
dom of Flo’s opinions,” answered Lester, 
rather dryly, ‘‘ and I don’t want to say 
anything against your father; but it does 
seem to me that denouncing and disinherit- 
ing and all that sort of thing is not exactly 
the style of the father in the parable of the 
Prodigal Son. I always supposed that in- 
tended to represent the one perfect Father. 
Besides, what’s the use ? E-eub is his father’s 
son and your brother, and forty circuses and 
a thousand disownings cannot make him one 
whit less the one or the other. — I wouldn’t 
be discouraged, Una,” he added, kindly, after 
a few moments’ silence ; he may turn out 
all right, after all. I can very easily imagine 
how a fellow might get restless, discontented 
and wild enough to do such a thing, and not 
be wholly bad, either.” 

They had left the more crowded streets 
and turned into quieter ways when the 
distant music finally assured them that they 
were in the right direction. Then occurred 


206 


UNITY DODGE. 


to Unity another thought, born of Flora’s 
remark in the afternoon. 

“ Lester, I am afraid this is hardly fair 
to you,” she said. ‘‘ However anxious I may 
be about my brother, you may feel it some 
disgrace to be — to have — ” 

“ Don’t worry your poor little heart about 
that,” interposed Lester, decidedly. ‘‘ When 
I have no sins of my own to be ashamed 
of, and have to fall back on my relations 
for my mortifications, I shall hold my head 
as high as a giraffe. Here we are. What 
a crowd !” 

It was not exactly an agreeable crowd for 
a lady to be in. There was too much jos- 
tling and pushing in the effort to reach the 
low entrance early enough to secure a good 
seat within, and the laughter and the remarks 
were too loud and too rude to be pleasant. 
Unity drew her hat a little lower over her 
flushed face and clung closely to her cousin’s 
arm. 

“ You want a seat where we can see with- 
out being in a position to be seen very dis- 
tinctly?” he questioned, in a low tone, when, 
by dint of mingled patience and elbowing, 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 207 

he had succeeded in landing her safely 
within the outer tent — a dreary, not very 
well lighted place — where a sparse collection 
of animals looked stupidly out from their 
cages. 

Una assented, and he drew her forward : 

“ We must go on at once, then, and find 
our places ; the people are already pushing 
into the second tent. You are sure that you 
made no mistake to-day, Una T’ 

“ Perfectly sure. I was not thinking of 
him until I saw him,” she answered. 

Lester said nothing more, but with the 
quick eye and skillful management of one 
accustomed to crowds scanned the tent, and, 
selecting the seat he deemed most suitable, 
pressed his way here and there through the 
slowly-moving throng until he reached it. 

Whatever the exhibition that followed was 
to others. Unity had little appreciation of it. 
The glittering tinsel, the painted faces, the 
flying horses, were but a confused mingliug 
of colors and shapes in which she watched 
anxiously for only one figure. The bursts 
of laughter at the clown’s stale jokes, the 
murmurs of applause at some dextrous feat, 


208 


UNITY DODOE. 


drew her attention here and there, but only 
to look for E-eub. A keen and watchful eye 
alone would have recognized him in that 
light and in the dress he wore when he at 
last appeared — somewhat in the background, 
for Reub was not a prominent member of even 
the poor society which he had joined. 

The trained dogs displayed their intelli- 
gence; the athletes and gymnasts lifted and 
hung, swung and clung, in the most aston- 
ishing positions; the animated bundle of 
paint and gauze sprang through hoops and 
alighted upon her horse as it dashed around 
the sawdust arena. 

Unity saw it all, not as a display, but as 
Eeub’s companions and surroundings; and 
she shuddered as she pictured to herself the 
life it must be — the tiresome days and the 
nights that could be nothing but this over 
and over again. She began to wonder how 
she should succeed in seeing Eeub, after all, 
and what she should say to him. Would he 
listen to her ? and how strange it would seem 
for her to be trying to reason and persuade 
him into some other way ! She had never 
done that with either of her brothers in all 


ONE FACE IN THE STREET-PARADE. 209 

her life. E-eub was far more likely to be 
surprised than influenced by anything she 
could say, she whispered, sadly, to herself. 
And, alas ! she could not urge him to go 
home : there was no welcome for him. Her 
eyes had followed his every movement here 
and there while she pondered, and at last he 
turned and met her gaze fully. Whether he 
really saw and recognized her she had not 
time to decide, for suddenly there was a cry, 
a fall, the slipping of a rope or the dropping 
of a plank, and instantly all was confusion. 
A murmur of horror ran along the rows of 
spectators. “ Somebody’s hurt,” “ Missed it 
and fell,” ‘‘ He’s killed,” passed from lip to 
lip as the people arose, pressing and crowd- 
ing upon one another. 

Lester turned a frightened face toward 
Unity, who was slow to arouse to an under- 
standing of what had happened. 

“ Who is hurt ? It wasn’t — Oh, Lester !” 
as his shocked, pitying glance was at last 
comprehended. ‘‘ Not Heub ?” 

‘‘ I fear so. I thought I saw — Don’t be 
frightened, Una.” He interrupted himself 
to draw her trembling hand within his arm 

14 


210 


UNITY DODGE. 


and hold it firmly there. ‘‘It was only a 
fall; not a bad one, perhaps.” 

The programme had been nearly given, 
and there was no effort to complete it. 
Lester drew Unity out of the throng as 
speedily as possible, and found a quiet place 
where she could stand for a few minutes 
unnoticed and unmolested. 

“ Wait here for a little until I can find 
where he is, and how,” he said. “ I won’t 
be long.” 

Notwithstanding his promise, it seemed to 
Unity a weary time that she waited there in 
loneliness and terrible suspense — long enough 
to imagine horrors innumerable, and to wish 
many times that she had insisted upon going 
with him — before Lester returned. 

“ We cannot see him to-night, Una ; I did 
all that I could, but it is impossible,” he 
reported. “He is not dangerously hurt: I 
learned that ; and they have taken him away 
to the hotel where the company stopped to- 
day, but I could not discover where it was. I 
will find him to-morrow if I have to search 
the city over, but we can do nothing to-night. 
You must go home now and try to be satis- 


ONE FACE IN THE STBEET-PARADE. 211 

fied that he is not dangerously injured and 
will be well cared for.” 

“ How did it happen ?” Unity remem- 
bered to ask a little later, when she had 
reluctantly yielded to Lester’s representation 
and they were slowly walking homeward. 

“ I do not know — ” Lester hesitated. 
“ They thought he was surprised by some- 
thing or some one and thrown off his guard 
for a minute, one of the men said. Una, I 
do not believe you’d better tell Flora any- 
thing of this ; it cannot do any good, and I 
think she would rather not know.” 

Una was not sure that she fully under- 
stood his meaning. Some reasons for the 
suggestion, however, she could comprehend 
very clearly ; and after a troubled review of 
the subject, their expedition and its results, 
she concluded with a sigh : 

“We ought never to have gone there. 
It was unwise, if nothing worse.” 

“Yes,” Lester assented, quietly. “But 
we did not think of that in time, and it is 
useless to think of it at all now.” 

Flora was waiting for them — home a long 
time from her committee-meeting, she said — 


212 


UNITY DODGE. 


and evidently somewhat surprised, though 
she did not directly remark upon it, at their 
long stay. 

Una’s utmost effort could not make her 
manner animated or her face other than 
pale and grave, and Flora noticed it won- 
deringly : 

“ You look more tired than refreshed by 
your evening’s entertainment. I don’t think 
it could have been very inspiriting. Where 
did you go?” 

But Lester interposed promptly : 

‘‘She is not to tell you anything about 
it. — Don’t answer any questions, Una. I 
have a right to a secret if I want one; 
and if we were not particularly successful 
in our choice to-night, we do not mean 
to publish our failure.” 

Flora laughed good-naturedly, and dropped 
the matter with the careless comment that 
whatever had been “ lacking in quality must 
have been atoned for by quantity.” 

But for Unity that night there were ex- 
cited, sleepless hours before she found the 
doubtful rest of rehearsing the whole scene 
in troubled dreams. 


CHAPTER X. 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST AND THE 
SPANGLES, 

T ESTER was out early the next morning, 
and Unity, sure of the errand upon which 
he had gone, found the time drag heavily 
while she tried to interest herself in Flora’s 
plans. 

The latter was proposing a shopping ex- 
pedition when Lester returned. He whis- 
pered, as he passed his cousin, 

‘‘I have found him.” 

‘‘It is only to match some silks,” pur- 
sued Flora, quite unconscious of the aside, 
“but that is sometimes an arduous under- 
taking.” 

“ And I want Una to go somewhere with 
me this forenoon,” interposed Lester. 

“ You awakened to an appreciation of her 
society last evening, and mean to monopolize 
it,” laughed Flora. “ You can carry out your 

213 


214 


UNITY LODGE. 


plan u23on some other occasion ; she wants to 
go with me.” 

‘‘No, please; not this time, Flora,” said 
Unity, hurriedly. “ Fd like to go with 
Lester to-day, if you don’t mind.” 

Flora’s blue eyes opened widely : 

“Certainly not. Do as you choose, of 
course.” 

If the reply was slightly cool and con- 
strained, Unity was too troubled and excited 
to notice it; but Lester was not, and he 
laughed softly — not his pleasantest laugh — 
as his cousin left the room. 

“I did not see him or let him know of 
my presence. I simply found where he was 
and came back for you,” Lester explained as 
they left the house. “ You will not find him 
in very sumptuous quarters, Una, though I 
suppose the place is comfortable enough ; 
and the house is respectable.” He hailed 
a passing car, which proved to be crowded, 
and there was no opportunity for further 
conversation. 

Unity’s thoughts, however, were too busy 
to care for words, since Lester could not 
understand all her perplexities, doubts and 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 215 

fears. She did not know with what recep- 
tion she might meet; she could not deter- 
mine what she should do or say ; and so it 
was with no clearly defined plans that she 
at last reached the house — a rather shabby 
one in regard to paint and architecture, but 
apparently clean and well-ordered enough. 

Lester made all necessary inquiries and 
arrangements without troubling Unity with 
any questions — a thoughtfulness for which 
she was grateful ; and after a brief waiting 
they were shown to an upper room, where, 
in a rocking-chair by a window, sat Reub 
with bandaged head and arm in splints. 
When he turned his face toward them as 
they entered, his expression was a curious 
mingling of shame, sullenness and pain, but 
there was not the surprise his sister had 
expected. 

So pale, wounded and forlorn did the poor 
fellow look, however, sitting there lonely and 
helpless that every other feeling was lost in 
pity, and Unity only exclaimed, tearfully, 
‘‘ Oh, Reub, I am so sorry 
“ You ought to be : you’re the cause of it 
all,” he answered, gruffly. “ If I hadn’t all 


216 


UNITY DODGE. 


of a sudden seen you there last night star- 
ing at me so, I shouldn’t have slipped.” 

Lester turned and walked away to the 
most distant window to study a landscape of 
alleys and back-yards, while he left the two 
to themselves. 

Unity’s distressed face at this version of 
the accident appealed to Beub’s better nature, 
though he was in no amiable mood, and he 
condescended to add : 

“ Well, I suppose you had a right to look 
if you wanted to, the same as anybody else 
who paid their money. I’m not killed, 
though I can’t say it would have been a 
great loss to myself or to any one else if I 
had been. But I don’t see how you came 
there — or here, either, for that matter.” 

“I’ve been here several weeks: I am 
visiting at uncle’s,” Unity explained. 

Eeub began a whistle of incredulous as- 
tonishment that ended in a half groan as a 
slight movement sent a twinge of pain 
through his arm. 

“ ‘ Visiting ’! Things must have taken a 
new turn since I came away. There was 
little chance for going off on journeys then, 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 217 

or for any other pleasure that other folks 
have, or I shouldn’t have been here.” He 
began the sentence sneering! y, but his voice 
dropped a little at the last. 

Unity had taken a low seat beside his 
chair, and she looked up quickly into his 
face : 

“Oh, Reub, I wish you had not gone 
away so! If you had only waited — ” 

Reub moved uneasily, and was again 
reminded of his condition by a dart of pain. 
The suffering probably added to the sharp- 
ness of his reply : 

“Waited for what? I wish you had 
stayed at home yourself instead of coming 
here to surprise me with your white face and 
make me fall as I did. I’m in a pretty way 
now, cooped up here. The company went 
on without me this morning. They would 
have stopped longer if one of the elephants 
had been sick : men are cheap.” 

Reuben was certainly in a bitter mood. 
It occurred to Unity that he had not found 
himself or his wishes of much more conse- 
quence to his new acquaintances than they 
had been at home; but she wisely decided 


218 


UNITY DODGE. 


not to comment upon that, and after a mo- 
ment’s silence asked if she could do any- 
thing to make him more comfortable. 

“No; I don’t see how you can. The 
doctor said he had done all he could, and 
that did not amount to much beyond setting 
my broken arm. If I hadn’t lamed my 
ankle among all the other knocks and 
bruises, I could have gone on with the 
rest.” 

“ You could not do anything if you were 
with them,” suggested Unity. 

“ No, but it would be better than staying 
in this stupid place. They have my money, 
too — nearly all that I have earned for several 
months.” 

Unity’s hand slipped into her pocket, and 
Keub laughed as he noticed the movement : 

“ Oh, I have a little — enough for now ; I 
don’t want any of yours. The millennium 
must be nearer than father calculates if John 
and Rlioda have given you anything to 
spare.” But the movement had touched 
him a little, notwithstanding his roughness. 
He looked at his sister curiously : “ I don’t 
see what made you come here. It must have 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 219 

been some trouble to hunt me up, and, as 
nearly as I could understand my last letter 
from home, no one there ever wanted to hear 
of me again. Father wasn’t at all sparing 
of his woes and denunciations. What did 
you come for? Just to see if that fall really 
killed me T 

‘‘ Do you think I could have waited until 
this morning before I knew whether you 
were dangerously hurt or not?” asked Un- 
ity, reproachfully. 

Reub laughed again, uneasily : 

“ I don’t know any special reason why 
you should be overwhelmingly anxious. 
Father as good as told me he’d rather I’d 
been drowned in the river than alive and 
well where I was.” 

‘‘I came because I wanted you to know 
that somebody did care for you — had cared 
all the time,” said Unity, in a low voice. 
‘‘ I saw you on the street yesterday, and I 
went to that place last night only in the 
hope of seeing yon. It was not the wisest 
way, but — ” 

“I should think not,” interposed Eeub; 
but the tone was gentler than the words. 


220 


UNITY DODGE. 


He was glad to see a face from home again, 
though he would not acknowledge it even to 
himself. There were questions he would 
have liked to ask, but his sullen pride held 
them back. 

“I thought if it had been different at 
home — if there had been somebody — you 
would not have gone away so. I wasn’t 
much of a sister to you : I was so young 
and I didn’t know ; but I have understood 
better since,” urged Unity, eagerly if not 
coherently. ‘‘And oh, E-eub, I wanted to 
ask you to give up this kind of life. You 
do not really like it ? I’m sure you can’t.” 

“ Well, I don’t think it is as choice a lot 
as some fellows have : I’ll own that.” Beub’s 
glance wandered from himself to Lester, 
standing at the distant window, and the 
sharp contrast once more stung him to bitter- 
ness. “ I won’t say it is what I would have 
chosen if I’d had a chance. I’m not alto- 
gether a fool. But I never had any chance 
— any choice. If father hadn’t been so busy 
hunting up woes for the whole world that he 
hadn’t any time to attend to his business or 
his children, we might have been like other 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 221 

people. There was no reason why he 
shouldn’t have done as well as his brother 
and again Reub’s gaze rested upon Lester. 
“We look like cousins, don’t we? He has 
a father.” 

“Oh, Reub, don’t!” The tone shocked 
Unity. “ Father may have made mistakes, 
but he never meant to wrong us; and he 
does care — more than you think. If you 
had seen how he looked when he thought 
you were drowned — ” 

“ Yes. He was so rejoiced when he found 
I was alive I” sneered Reub. “ His letter 
showed that.” 

“ He was dreadfully grieved and angry 
when he learned what you had done,” an- 
swered the sister, growing brave. “ But, 
Reub, can you wonder? You know what 
he thinks of such a life as you are living, 
and you know yourself that it is neither 
a good nor a useful one. If you did not 
know it when you first began it, you do 
now ; and you also know that you are 
ashamed of it.” 

“You are putting it pretty strong, I think,” 
said Reub, looking at her in astonishment. 


222 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘You were not so much in the habit of 
speaking your mind — if you had any — when 
I was at home. John and E-hoda wouldn’t 
have enjoyed it. What is the use of coming 
here and talking to me in this fashion ? It’s 
easy enough to say, ‘ Quit this,’ but can you 
tell me what to do instead? I can’t go 
home : you know that as well as I do ; and 
I haven’t been educated for anything. Be- 
sides, I’m not cheating or stealing, or any- 
thing else of the sort; and if you think 
my business is so very disgraceful, what 
did you hunt me up for? Why do you 
care so much?” 

“Because you are my brother, and be- 
cause — Oh, Beub, I do care. I wish I 
had understood it all earlier, and had felt 
as I do now; maybe I could have made 
home happier for you and Warren. I have 
learned some things, and I mean to be — I 
hope I am — a Christian.” It was not easy 
to say those last words with Beub’s eyes 
fixed upon her in that peculiar way. She 
knew so well what would be the association 
of ideas in his mind that she was prepared 
for the next remark: 


APART FROM THE SAWDVST 223 

‘‘ So father’s wheels and signs have scared 
you at last, have they?” 

“No, not that, but something else has 
won me. I wish you would read for your- 
self, Reub, and see — ” 

“ No, thank you !” he interrupted, with 
emphatic haste. “All the results of Bible- 
reading I have so far seen haven’t been of 
a kind to tempt me in that direction.” 

Unity tried to urge that there were other 
teachings than the mysterious prophecies 
which even yet she herself shrank from 
reading, poor child ! She tried to tell him 
of the words of life and comfort, the plain 
directions and precious promises; but she 
had never been sufficiently well acquainted 
with this brother to talk freely with him, 
and she could not do it now. He was, more- 
over, in no mood to listen to her, and the 
interview was altogether an unsatisfactory 
one. Her remonstrances against the course 
he had chosen were useless, he said, since 
he could not help himself now, in any case ; 
there was no other way open to him. He 
rejected the few offers she could make in 
the way of providing for his comfort. He 


224 


UNITY DODGE. 


needed nothing more than he had or could 
get, unless she could make him sound and 
well again ; he would thank anybody who 
would do that. 

Yet it seemed to Unity’s yearning heart 
so lonely and forlorn to leave him there 
helpless and alone that she lingered irreso- 
lutely at the doorway. 

‘‘ I will come and see you again to-mor- 
row,” she said. 

Well !” 

And with only that ungracious monosyl- 
lable the girl was obliged to depart, though 
very uncertain whether it expressed gratifi- 
cation at, or even toleration of, her proposed 
visit. 

Except a few words on first entering and 
his brief “Good-bye” at last, Lester had 
not spoken while in the room, but a part 
of what passed he had unavoidably heard. 
He maintained decorous silence until they 
had passed through the halls and down 
into the street, and then he remarked ex- 
plosively, 

“ Well, Flora thinks I’m something of a 
trial as a brother : I wonder how she would 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 


225 


like Reub by way of a change ?” Then he 
looked at his cousin and added, half peni- 
tently, “ I beg your pardon, Una ; I couldn’t 
help it.” 

“ I know.” Una smiled rather sadly. 
‘‘Speaking of Flora,” she said, wistfully, 
“I do not like keeping this a secret from 
her; it seems almost treacherous.” 

“It is a sort of treachery for which she 
would thank you,” answered Lester, de- 
cidedly. 

Unity sighed. She was hedged about in 
so many ways that she could do but little 
for her brother, even had he been willing 
that she should help him; and his own un- 
willingness was the greatest bar of all. 

“ If mother were at home — ” began Lester, 
more with an idea of softening his last remark 
than because he had anything definite to say. 
But, whatever conclusion he had intended the 
sentence to bear, it was left unfinished as a 
tall, gentlemanly-looking person passed them, 
greeting Lester and bestowing an instant’s 
keen scrutiny on his companion, with evi- 
dent surprise at meeting them in that 
quarter of the city. 

15 


226 


VNITY DODGE. 


‘‘ That fellow back again already ?” mut- 
tered Lester, scarcely waiting for the other 
to pass out of hearing. 

Unity looked wonderingly up at him. 
She had wondered at his curt reply to 
the courteous salutation. 

Lester’s frowning brows relaxed a little at 
her glance, and he forced a laugh : 

“ Oh, he has a right to be in the city if 
he wants to ; he certainly owns far more of 
its real estate than I do, and a large enough 
share in its interests. Only he has been 
away for a few weeks, and I hoped he would 
stay all summer. When he is in town I see 
far more of him than suits me. He is sup- 
posed to be a friend of the family.” 

‘‘And you don’t like him ? A friend of 
your father, I suppose?” said Unity, too 
preoccupied with other thoughts to be 
deeply interested in her cousin’s dislike 
of this passing stranger. 

Lester laughed once more : 

“Oh yes, of course! That is the way 
Flora introduces him — ‘A friend of papa’s.’ 
I don’t believe the man ever was, or ever 
will be, a friend of anybody’s except in 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 227 

SO far as he can make them serve some 
purpose of his own. He is entirely too 
intent upon carrying on his own projects, 
and in adding to his wealth without caring 
how, to be capable of any real friendship. 
Flora says he is very susceptible to good 
influences, but I happen to know that he 
is something a great deal more than sus- 
ceptible to bad ones. He has money, 
though, and fine manners, and they cover 
any amount of evil that would be very 
visible in a poorer and less-cultured sin- 
ner.” 

It was late when they reached home, but 
they found Flora in too great perturbation 
to ask any troublesome questions about their 
expedition. 

I’m glad you have come ; I am in such 
a worry !” she said, by way of greeting. 
‘‘Hannah has gone away.” 

“ Hannah ! Gone where ?” questioned Les- 
ter. “Have you inaugurated your new re- 
gime by sending her ofi* the first day?” 

“Of course I didn’t.” Flora’s fair face 
was flushed, and she answered shortly. 
“Some of her people were sick — a sister. 


228 


UNITY DODGE. 


I believe — and they sent for her. It seems 
to me that they might have found some one 
else to take care of her without sending for 
Hannah; but she thought she must go at 
once. It is very provoking.” 

‘‘As Hannah doesn’t belong to a mission 
school, she has no business with sick rela- 
tives, and they have no right to need look- 
ing after,” commented Lester, meaningly. 
Then, as the flush on his sister’s face deep- 
ened, he hastened to add : “ However, I 
don’t think the house will come to destruc- 
tion while she is gone. Girls are plenty ; 
we can find some one else to come and stay 
for a week or two.” 

“ That is all you know about it,” replied 
Flora, loftily. “There are plenty of girls, 
certainly, but few of them that we would 
want in the house. There are not many 
like Hannah. — There has been a large bas- 
ket of cherries sent home for canning this 
morning, too,” she added, turning away 
from her brother to Unity, as to one with 
sufficient comprehension of the case to sym- 
pathize. “I really do not know what we 
shall do.” 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 229 

‘‘Why, we will can them,” said Unity, 
promptly. “I know how.” 

“And there is no dinner cooked, either,” 
pursued Flora, reviewing the whole deplor-- 
able state of affairs. 

“We will cook it, then,” declared Unity, 
cheerily. This sudden emergency was good 
for her: it gave her something to do and 
forced her thoughts into a new channel, and 
she brightened at once. — “What is there 
for dinner ?” she asked, when she had has- 
tily changed her street-dress and donned a 
neat little apron which she had scarcely 
dared to show until now. 

“ I’m sure I don’t know,” said Flora, still 
despondently. “ Hannah said something 
about the vegetables, and a chicken that 
either did or did not come, and some steak 
to be broiled. She was in such a hurry that 
she scarcely told anything straight. She said 
there was pie : I remember that.” 

“Then we are sure of something to end 
on if we can only raise something to begin 
with,” laughed Lester. “ I suppose we can 
find the available material on hand by in- 
specting the premises.” He and Unity in- 


230 


VNITY DODGE. 


stituted a search, and a dinner was soon in 
course of preparation, with Unity installed 
as cook. 

Flora undertook to set the table — a task 
which she accomplished with so many omis- 
sions that the meal was eaten “after the 
manner of jumping-jacks,” Lester declared, 
as one or another of the trio was constantly 
running after missing articles. They grew 
very merry over the performance, however, 
and enjoyed the dinner unusually. 

Even Flora’s spirits revived, and she be- 
gan to look more hopefully forward to the 
afternoon’s labors. 

“What a treasure you are, Una!” she 
said, gratefully. — “ Don’t go away this after- 
noon if you can help it, Lester. Somebody 
may come ; and if we are both deep in those 
cherries — ” 

“I intend he shall be deep in them too, 
if he stays,” said Unity. — “You can make 
yourself very useful with the cherry-pitter, 
sir.” 

It was a pleasant kitchen. Hannah had 
left it in respectable order, and the sun 
shone into it brightly that afternoon. The 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST 231 

three in unaccustomed possession of it 
laughed and chatted over their novel work 
— novel to at least two of them — and Unity 
worked, explained and directed, laughing to 
herself now and then as she wondered what 
E/hoda would think of a household so in- 
competent that even she — Unity — was con- 
sidered a marvel of capacity in it. 

The seeding and the canning were going 
on finely when the door-bell rang. Lester, 
with one of Hannah’s aprons thrown over 
his knees and the cuffs he had forgotten 
to remove plentifully decorated with cherry- 
juice, looked up in dismay. 

Flora laughed : 

“ I’ll go myself ; I am not such a picture 
as you are.” She shook out the dainty dress 
that she had carefully protected, glanced at 
her hair in the tiny mirror and vanished up 
the stairs. 

A moment later the two in the kitchen 
heard the faint murmur of voices in the 
room above ; and when the minutes had- 
lengthened into half an hour, there came 
the sound of the piano. 

‘‘ Well, that is cool !” commented Lester, 


232 


UNITY DODGE. 


in some astonishment. “ I think she might 
have explained the situation and postponed 
a concert.” 

It was not cool in the kitchen, as the fire 
in the range was kept up to the requisite 
heat for the fruit that boiled and bubbled 
while Unity carefully watched and attend- 
ed to it. She missed Flora’s aid, such as it 
was, and disliked taking the entire responsi- 
bility ; for Lester answered her inquiries as 
to whether they liked their cherries simply 
stewed or partly preserved with a blissful 
masculine uncertainty : 

“ Yes — I don’t know. What is the dif- 
ference? I thought everybody did such 
things alike. If there are two ways, do 
them your way ; that is likely to be just 
as good as any.” 

Unity’s way it had to be ; for, though she 
momentarily expected her cousin’s return, 
two full hours had elapsed, the last of the 
fruit was safely canned, and Unity, flushed 
.and heated, was putting away the cooking- 
utensils, when Flora tripped into the room 
again : 

‘‘All through ? How nice they look ! It 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST 


233 


was too bad to desert you so, but I couldn’t 
well help it. Mr. Kiuley came, and — ” 

“Humph!” interrupted Leslie. “If I 
had even thought of him, I’d have gone to 
the door myself. I think I could have pre- 
vented his making a very long call, or any 
call at all.” 

“ He has been away for some weeks, and 
returned to the city only last evening.” 
Flora pursued her explanation to Unity 
without seeming to notice her brother’s 
remark. “Of course he had many things 
to tell and old friends to inquire for. He is 
an old acquaintance of papa’s. I’m sorry 
to have left you so long alone, Una dear; 
but you have done beautifully, and I’m a 
thousand times obliged to you. Do come 
up stairs now and rest before tea-time. 
Dear me I I wish Hannah were back ! — 
Lester, where shall we look for another girl ?” 

“ You might have asked Mr. Kinley that 
question. I presume there are enough 
poorly-paid girls working for his shops 
who would be glad to exchange for fair 
wages in a respectable kitchen,” suggested 
Lester, maliciously. 


234 


UNITY DODGE. 


It was not a practical suggestion, and 
Flora ignored both it and the speaker as 
she drew Una away : 

“ Do come up stairs and rest. You shall 
lie on the lounge, and I have the prettiest 
little sketch to read to you.” 

‘‘ The idea of lying down to rest after that 
bit of work!” laughed Unity. “Bhoda 
would be horrified. We will hear the 
sketch, though, won’t we ? — Come, Lester,” 
she called to her colaborer. 

The cloud passed, and the three spent the 
next hour amicably together; but Unity 
found her thoughts wandering even from 
the interesting reading to wonder why 
Flora’s influence, so potent with others, 
seemed to weigh so lightly with her own 
brother. Then her mind strayed to another 
brother and the influences which had shaped 
his life. ' Poor Keub I What could she do 
for him ? She began to consider uneasily, 
too, that in the present state of domestic 
affairs at her uncle’s it would be difficult 
for her to see him. Flora was so dependent 
upon her assistance that she could not easily 
be spared. Certainly it could not be accom- 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 235 

plished without inquiries which would involve 
a full explanation. But all anxious planning 
upon that point was ended the next morning 
when a shabby-looking boy brought a note 
informing her that Beub had gone. Two 
of the campany had returned for him, and, 
as the surgeon who attended him had de- 
cided that his injuries were not such as to 
render removal really dangerous, they had 
determined to risk the inconvenience, and 
had made arrangements for his traveling. 

‘‘ I thought I^d let you know, so you need 
not come away out here again,” Beub had 
written, hastily. Maybe I did care more 
about your taking so much trouble for me 
than I showed. Unity. Anyhow, I know it 
was kind of you to want to show me that 
all my folks had not cast me off ; IVe sense 
enough to understand that. But, you see, 
it’s no use trying to make me into some- 
thing different. There’s nothing I can do, 
and no chance for me; and I’d rather go 
on with the fellows than to stay moping 
here. Don’t worry about it, though ; it isn’t 
worth while.” 

Neither the carelessly scrawled missive 


236 


UNITY DODGE. 


nor the seedy messenger met Flora’s eyes. 
Unity herself had seen the boy on the steps, 
and he had thrust the note into her hand 
and hurried away, as if glad that a dis- 
agreeable duty were accomplished. She had 
therefore no opportunity to gain further in- 
telligence than Reub himself had communi- 
cated. Later in the day Lester visited the 
hotel, but the people there only corroborated 
the tidings of his departure, without being 
able to tell where he had gone. 

Unity was sadly troubled. 

“I don’t know what I could have done 
for him if he had stayed, but I hoped I 
could do something,” she said. 

Lester looked at her, at a loss for any 
words of comfort. 

“ Do you believe in Providence ?” he asked. 

“Why, yes, I suppose I do,” Unity an- 
swered, slowly. The thought of a tender, 
watchful Love ruling over all her life’s 
little daily events was still so new to her 
that she was only just beginning to recog- 
nize it. “Don’t you?” 

“Because, if you do,” continued Lester, 
passing by the question, “ you must believe 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST 237 

that this wasn’t any mere accident or hap- 
pening, but that God took the work out of 
your hands ; and so you need not worry 
because you could not do it.” 

Unity carried the thought still farther. 
God, who knew how much this work needed 
to be done, could give it to fitter hands than 
hers ; and she prayed for Reub with stronger 
faith than she had known before. 

Meanwhile, as the days passed, there was 
work enough for Unity to do. Hannah did 
not return, and Lester’s visits to the intelli- 
gence ofiices did not furnish any one who 
was at once competent and willing to sup- 
ply a temporary demand. 

‘‘ The good ones want a place where they 
can stay, and the poor ones we don’t want 
even for two or three days,” he reported. 

Flora was in distress because she had 
invited the young people’s mission band to 
meet at her home that week, and the cus- 
tomary tea must be furnished. It was now 
too late to have any other place of meeting 
appointed, and what could be done? She 
looked appealingly at Unity, and Unity, glad 
to help in any of Flora’s grand work, ques- 


238 


UNITY DODGE. 


tioned what would be required, and thought 
they could manage it themselves. 

“ Do you ?” Flora’s eyes brightened. “ I 
never should dare undertake it alone; but 
if you think we can do it, everything will 
be right, I am sure. You know so much 
about such things! I wanted the band to 
meet here particularly on your account, Una ; 
I thought you would enjoy it.” 

It was not unmixed enjoyment, however, 
for Flora had so many little things to attend 
to, and so many interruptions from callers, 
that the burden of the preparatory work fell 
upon Unity, and even during the important 
afternoon itself she saw far more of the 
kitchen than of the parlor above, where gay 
voices were chatting while skillful lingers 
worked on the articles for the mission boxes. 
She was introduced to Flora’s friends, in- 
deed, in her flying visits to the upper rooms, 
but she fancied many of them were no wiser 
than the one whom she overheard remark to 
a companion : 

“ How nice it is for Flora to have a young 
cousin living near who can run in and help 
her in an emergency !” 


APART FROM THE SAWDUST. 239 

The tea was a success: the whole after- 
noon had been one, Flora declared, in a 
gratified tone, when it was over : 

“It was too bad that it kept you busy 
down stairs so much of the time, though. 
I would have insisted upon changing places 
with you — I did so want you to enjoy some 
of the pleasant conversation and the reading 
of those letters — but I knew I should be 
perfectly useless down here alone.” 

That last was certainly true, but, even 
while she assented. Unity secretly wondered 
how long it would be, at the present rate 
of progress, before Flora could be anything 
else. She was heartily glad when her aunt 
returned, and was followed a few days later 
by Hannah, so that household affairs could 
assume their normal condition, and her 
cousin could once more comfortably pursue 
the course she liked best. 

“ Only it does seem to me. Flora,” remon- 
strated Mrs. Dodge, when three rather lonely 
afternoons had succeeded one another, and a 
fourth, with a headache for a companion, did 
not look inviting, “that you might stay at 
home a little more. It cannot be absolutely 


240 


UNITY DODGE. 


necessary for you to attend to so many 
things.” 

“ I know, mamma, it does appear just so 
at a glance— as if there could not be much 
harm in neglecting these meetings occasion- 
ally,” admitted Flora, sweetly ; ‘‘ but it is 
one of the beginnings of evil, and I think 
we ought to train ourselves to be very quick 
to detect wrong anywhere.” 

‘‘ Except in Flora Dodge,” suggested 
Lester, quietly. 


CHAPTEE XI. 

NOT ACOOBDINO TO THE PATTERN. 

lyrOT SO many of the city fashions as 
Rhoda had hoped, but countless new 
thoughts and plans, Unity brought home 
with her when her visit, protracted beyond 
its first intent, finally ended. There were 
so many things she wanted to do, so much 
work that ought to be done, that she was 
eager to begin. Yet the beginning was a 
diflicult matter. 

Rhoda was surprised at the promptness 
with which her sister-in-law despatched her 
share of the work on the first Sunday after 
her return — Sunday was usually a day of 
rather leisurely doing at the farmhouse — and 
made ready for church. 

“ I don’t believe jQhn’ll want to take out 
the light wagon. There’s a bolt broken, and 
he said it oughtn’t to be used again until he 
had time to mend it,” she remarked. 

16 241 


242 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘ Never mind ; I can walk,” Unity an- 
swered, pleasantly. ‘‘ I mean to grow accus- 
tomed to walking.” 

The country church, with its plain con- 
gregation, was very unlike the one she had 
lately attended, but that mattered little. The 
words of life were the same, the gray-haired 
old pastor spoke of the same gracious Master 
and Lord, and the heart of the young lis- 
tener thrilled to a more tender love, a deeper 
earnestness, as she sat there. She stayed to 
the Sunday-school that followed, hoping to 
find some class that she could enter, but 
there seemed to be none ; and while she 
lingered, waiting and disappointed, the 
superintendent came to her. He was a 
slow, unpretending man, possessed of sin- 
cere piety, the best of intentions and very 
little executive ability. He conducted the 
school as he did his small store, pursuing 
the same dull, simple routine week after 
week without a thought of variation : 

‘‘Won^t you take a class. Miss — Miss 
Dodge, I believe it is ? I thought I knew 
you, though we haven’t seen you here very 
often,” he continued, as Unity acknowledged 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN 243 

her name. ^‘Glad to see you to-day. Won’t 
you take a class? There’s a class of boys 
over there that needs a teacher right bad.” 

‘‘ Oh, I don’t think — I have never 
taught — I don’t think I could,” stam- 
mered Unity, thrown into utter discomfit- 
ure by the unexpected request. “I hoped 
to go into a class where I could be a learner 
myself. I would be willing to help if I were 
fitted for it, but I know so little yet.” 

‘‘ Well, there don’t seem to be any such 
class. Some Bible classes would be a good 
thing if we could get them rightly started,” 
admitted the superintendent, surveying his 
domain. “ But the fact is, it’s pretty hard 
work now to get teachers enough for the 
classes we have.” He looked over at the 
wriggling, uneasy boys and back at Unity 
again. ‘‘Guess you’d better try it, hadn’t 
you ? It isn’t very hard — just sort of keep 
them in order, you know, hear the verses 
and tell them what the lesson means. Sow 
a little of the good seed,” he explained, 
confidentially. 

Unity, looking at his rugged, earnest, per- 
plexed face, and seeing that he was really at 


244 


UNITY DODGE. 


a loss to provide for the class, reluctantly 
yielded. Notwithstanding the superintend- 
ent’s statement of the simplicity of the 
undertaking, it had its difficulties, as she 
soon discovered. The boys were far more 
at ease than she in the new relation. 

“ I do not know much about this school,” 
she said, trying to speak naturally. “I 
have been away for some time, too, so you 
must tell me what you do.” 

“ Sayversesandcatechismquestions,” an- 
swered one of the urchins, without taking 
the trouble to separate his remark into 
words and punctuating it with a yawn. 

It required a moment’s study to understand 
the observation. 

“Bible verses? and catechism?” Unity 
questioned. “ We will have those first, then. 
— How many know any to repeat ?” 

Four of the half dozen avowed their ability, 
but the knowledge appeared to be involved 
in a mist of uncertainty, and the recita- 
tion required much prompting. Moreover, 
while the boy at the head of the class was strug- 
gling through his partially-committed texts, 
the boy at the lower end was busily engaged 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN 245 

in catching flies and imprisoning them in the 
hymn-book box. When the lower boy was 
called upon to recite the one at the head 
compared marbles with the classmate next 
him, and the boy in the middle of the 
row occupied his leisure minutes in mak- 
ing paper wads. 

Unity despairingly looked along the line. 
This might be the regular routine, but it 
certainly was not the way of “ keeping them 
in good order.” She resolved upon an inno- 
vation : 

‘‘ I think we will let the verses go for this 
time and study something that will interest 
all of us at once,” she said. 

While the teacher was turning to the les- 
son for the day, one of the small boys, with 
a view to gratifying his curiosity and at 
the same time saying something eminently 
proper, inquired; 

‘‘Say! does your father know when the 
world’ll come to an end? Somebody said 
he did.” 

“ I do not think any one can know that,” 
she answered, quietly, though flushing a 
little. “ Jesus did not tell us when it would 


246 


UNITY DODGE. 


be, but he told us what we must do and how 
we must live to be ready for it. For the 
world may end for us, you know — our life 
in it may end — any minute. This is one 
of the chapters that tell us about it.” 

After all, the awkward inquiry made an 
auspicious opening for the lesson ; and by 
pursuing it in the form of mingled narrative 
and questions she managed to hold their 
attention — in a measure, at least — and 
might have done so still more successfully 
but for having the half hour intersected by 
the visits of the young man who collected 
the missionary pennies, the boy who distrib- 
uted papers and the man who wanted to 
know what had become of a book missing 
from the library. 

Had this really been sowing ‘‘good seed” ? 
Unity wondered as she turned away for the 
closing hymn. 

“Are you going to teach this class all the 
time?” asked one of the boys, adding, with 
gracious condescension, “ Uause we’d as lief 
have you as anybody, far as I know. We 
ain’t very particular.” 

The superintendent was particular. He 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN. 247 

was very anxious that Miss Dodge should 
keep the class, and strongly urged his plea 
when the school had ended : 

“ You, see, we need you.’’ 

“ I have had no experience. If I thought 
I could do it — ” Unity half consented. 
“But, Mr. Graves, couldn’t there be some 
better way of taking the collections and of 
arranging about books?” and she began to 
tell him what she had seen elsewhere. 

“Well, yes, I suppose likely there are 
better plans for some things,” the old gen- 
tleman admitted, slowly. “But this isn’t 
a city church, you see; we don’t have all 
the material. And then folks here sort of 
hang on to old ways. You haven’t been 
here long enough yet to know just how 
it is.” 

Unity flushed. How absurd, not to say 
conceited, she must appear in proposing 
changes and improvements the very first 
day she entered the school ! She had not 
thought of that in her eager projects, but 
she made no further suggestions and pru- 
dently resolved to watch and wait for a 
little while. 


248 


UNITY DODGE. 


On the whole, thinking it over on her 
homeward way, she was not really dissatisfied 
with her day’s experience, nor discouraged 
about the class of boys so unexpectedly placed 
in her care. She was making busy plans for 
them as she walked slowly along the shaded 
road, when her eyes fell upon another boy, 
playing with a small dog in the grass that 
fringed the way. So soiled and unkempt he 
was, with clothing the worse for several rents, 
that he attracted her closer attention and 
suggested the children she had met in the 
streets of the city when she went with her 
cousin on some errand connected with her 
mission work. She knew what Flora would 
do in such an encounter as this, and remem- 
bered her saying, “ You will always think to 
speak to such ones after this.” 

“ You have not been to Sunday-school to- 
day, have you ?” Unity asked, rather timidly; 
for the work was new to her. 

“ No’m,” answered the boy, indifferently. 

“ Why don’t you go ?” 

‘‘Can’t. Hain’t got any clothes. Mar’s 
sick.” He was about the age of the boys in 
her own class. Perhaps a little effort might 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN. 249 

bring him into it and induce him to come 
regularly. 

‘‘Where does your mother live?” Unity 
asked, carefully noting in her mind the 
directions given and determining to find 
the place the next day. 

The next day was a hard one. Rhoda 
generally contrived that washing-days should 
be hard, being one of those persons who 
consider it clear gain always to add to work 
enough a little more that “ might as well be 
done while we are at it.” So it was late in 
the afternoon before everything was out of 
the way and Baby so soundly asleep as to 
promise a little leisure in that direction. 

Unity was very tired and longed to enjoy 
the precious bit of time with a book in the 
depths of the old rocking-chair, but she 
bravely said to herself, “ If I am to do any- 
thing at all, it must be in just such odds 
and ends of time, and very often when I 
am tired ;” so she adhered to her resolution 
and set forth on the long walk. 

The place was easily found, but Unity, 
shrinking a little from her errand, approach- 
ed it slowly, and paused a moment on the 


250 


UNITY DODGE. 


steps to gain courage for her opening remark. 
No time was allowed, however, for the door 
was suddenly thrown open without waiting 
for her knock, and a woman with a baby 
in her arms greeted her with a disagreeable 
stare of inquiry. 

‘‘ Mrs. Green ?” said Unity, interrogatively. 

‘‘ Yes’m ; that’s my name.” The tone sug- 
gested that the owner of the name expected 
to be contradicted and was willing to main- 
tain her assertion by force of arms. 

“I met your little boy as I was coming 
from church yesterday,” began the visitor, 
“and I thought — ” 

“ Yes’m ; so he told me,” interrupted the 
woman, her black eyes snapping as she so 
held the door that it precluded even the 
suspicion of a welcome to enter. “And I 
think that some folks had better ’tend to 
their own affairs and let other folks’s alone. 
If Johnny has been kept home for two 
Sundays — partly because I wanted him to 
’tend Baby and partly ’count of being sick 
with neuralagy myself, so I hadn’t time nor 
strength to mend his clothes and fix him 
up — it ain’t no great things. Land knows 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN. 251 

he goes reg’lar enough most of the time, 
as I should think you might have seen 
if you’d been there yourself. Mebby you 
wasn’t. I try to do my duty by my chil- 
dren, I do, and we ain’t beggars nor hea- 
thens, and don’t need anybody to come 
round and look after us.” 

‘‘ I beg your pardon,” murmured the 
abashed Unity as soon as she could find 
an opportunity to speak. ‘‘ I meant nothing 
but kindness, and I misunderstood your 
little boy. I thought you were sick, and 
that perhaps I could help — ” 

“ Well, I don’t need no help, thank you,” 
interposed the woman again, in no wise 
mollified. ‘‘ You are that Dodge girl, ain’t 
you? Well, I guess your folks ain’t so 
dreadful particular about going to church 
themselves that they need worry about any 
one else staying away a couple of Sundays. 
If they are, they’ve got so lately. Mebby 
I’d better call round to your house and 
ask ’em why they don’t go ?” and she closed 
the door with a bang. 

Astonished, mortified and indignant. Unity 
turned away. All her long walk and kindly 


252 


UNITY DODGE. 


purposes to end in such treatment as this! 
After she had gone a few yards, however, 
her flushed face cooled and she laughed. 
The boy had not told her that he was not 
in the habit of attending Sunday-school, 
she recollected ; she had only taken that 
for granted. Perhaps some one would do 
well to call on the members of her own 
family, as Mrs. Green had suggested: cer- 
tainly she had not thought of beginning 
her missionary labors there. It was evident 
that her country home was not the city, and 
that precisely Flora’s methods would not 
answer here; and, somewhat wiser, but ex- 
ceedingly perplexed, she pursued the re- 
mainder of her walk. 

A few weeks after her return, however. 
Unity one day saw in one of the village 
papers, among a variety of items gathered 
from abroad, notice that a certain circus 
company would tarry for a time at a town 
in a neighboring State, awaiting the repair 
of cages and wagons which had suffered 
in a late railroad accident. The paragraph 
would have meant nothing to any other 
member of the family, but Unity recognized 


NOT ACCORDINO TO THE PATTERN. 253 

the name as that of the company in which 
she had found Reub, and she seized the 
opportunity afforded by this first clue to 
his whereabouts to write to him at once, 
enclosing her letter to the manager of the 
company. Day after day passed without an 
answer, until so long a time had elapsed that 
she had abandoned all hope of hearing from 
it, when there arrived a packet which proved 
to be her own letter enclosed in a note, not 
easy to decipher, from some one in charge 
of the company: 

There was a young man named Reuben 
Dodge with us for a while — was here before 
I took the company, I believe — but he was 
hurt in a fall several months ago, and before 
he got well a brother or uncle, or some re- 
lation, sent for him and took him away. 
Never heard from him afterward, and don’t 
know where he is.” 

That was all Unity obtained after much 
study. There was some mistake about it. 
Poor Reub had no brother or uncle to help 
him, and the writer had probably confounded 
him with some one else who had been in his 
employ. Only one thing seemed certain — 


254 


UNITY DODGE. 


that he had left the company and for her 
all trace of him was lost. She did not tell 
any one what she had learned ; she had not 
told of meeting K-eub in the city : there was 
no one who she felt quite sure would care ; 
but the thought of Reub burdened her heart 
through many a stormy night that winter, 
and a vision of him as a hungry, shelterless 
wanderer haunted her many a time as she 
sat at the well-filled table. There was noth- 
ing she could do for him but to pray and 
wait. 

But the girl’s regrets for the past years, to- 
gether with some practical refiections awak- 
ened by Mrs. Green’s unpleasant remark, 
aroused her to new thoughts concerning 
her influence at home. The daily life there 
seemed soon to have drawn her into its cur- 
rent as of old, and to be flowing on very 
much as it had done before she went away. 
Not quite, however, for Bhoda could not 
rid herself of an impression, acquired she 
scarcely knew when or why, that this was 
not exactly the Unity she had known in 
the past. 

“ It is not that she has grown stylish or 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN 255 

cityfied or is trying to put on any new airs 
and graces,” she mused, secretly watching 
her young sister-in-law, but some way she 
is different.” 

The undefinable change somewhat troubled 
E>hoda. It irritated her because she could 
not understand it, yet involuntarily she 
yielded a new respect to the new look that 
she sometimes met in Unity’s eyes, to the 
new tone in her voice — quieter and gentler, 
if possible, than ever before, but more de- 
termined also, as if her life had found some 
new purpose and meaning and outward events 
were treated with reference to it, all speech 
and action shaped by it. Even more con- 
siderate and obliging than of old was Unity; 
yet it was not now because she had no opin- 
ions, nor because she feared, upon sufficient 
occasion, to express them. E-hoda had more 
help in her plans than ever before, but she 
had also a secret consciousness that she no 
longer ruled. 

‘‘I don’t see,” said Ehoda, half impa- 
tiently, as she was trimming the lamps one 
morning, “ what notion has taken your father 
lately. He used to be satisfied with one 


256 


UmTY DODGE. 


lamp in his room, but for some months now 
he thinks he must have two. He complains 
that the oil must be poor, but I don^t see 
but it is as good as ever it was. We pay 
as much for it ; and more too, now that he 
burns so much. You’d better set those lamps 
with the small burners forward on the shelf, 
Unity, so that he’ll take them instead of the 
larger ones. He turns on such a blaze that 
it burns out the oil dreadfully, any way. 
Those will do him just as well if he doesn’t 
notice when he takes them. It is only a 
notion of his that he wants two.” 

“ It is probably a notion that he wants 
more light, though, instead of more lamps,” 
answered Unity, smiling, but quietly dis- 
regarding the instructions. 

Rhoda frowned as she saw her arrange the 
lamps in the usual order. For a moment she 
thought she would change them herself; 
then she glanced at Unity again, and, for 
some reason not clearly defined even in her 
own mind, decided to let them alone. But 
it was this sense of not being monarch of all 
she surveyed which, when John remarked 
that evening, “Well, I don’t know as that 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN 257 

visit in town did Unity any hurt, after all. 
You were afraid it would, but she seems to 
have come back just what she was before,” 
made her answer rather tartly : 

‘‘ Maybe she is, and maybe she isn’t. She 
doesn’t appear the same to me ; she is more 
like Flora — only she isn’t like her, either. 
I’m tired of trying to make it out, but I 
don’t think it did her any great good.” 

Unconscious of the watchfulness, uncon- 
scious that there was in herself any suffi- 
ciently apparent change to cause it. Unity 
went on her daily way, trying to be patient - 
and interested in many things that were 
tiresome and distasteful, trying to do ‘‘ heart- 
ily as unto the Lord and not unto men ” what- 
ever she did, yet often sorely dissatisfied and 
troubled because she could not make her life 
into what it seemed to her it ought to be. 
Flora, who had first won her to see the 
“beauty of holiness,” stood always before 
her as her ideal of Christian loveliness and 
usefulness. It was the Master’s work that 
Flora was doing, and surely that ought to be 
done here as well as there ; but the failure 
in finding it or in making it what she 

17 


258 


UNITY DODGE. 


thought it ought to be perplexed and dis- 
couraged her. She had grown greatly inter- 
ested in her class of boys, and they were be- 
coming attached to her also ; but she could 
not talk with them nor manage them as her 
cousin did her class. They came to her 
with no such questions and problems, and 
she distrusted her own methods and success, 
such as they were. Her first interview with 
the superintendent and her call upon Mrs. 
Green had not been her only futile efforts ; 
and at last, one day, in one of her deepest 
moods of discouragement, she met the gray- 
haired old pastor and poured out to him the 
story of her troubles and bewilderments. It 
marked a decided growth in herself that she 
dared to talk to him at all, and still more 
that she cared to talk to him upon such a 
subject ; but she did not think of that. He 
listened to her very quietly — so quietly that 
she began to wonder whether he were listen- 
ing at all — and then suddenly turned upon 
her with the question : 

“ My child, did you ever read the account 
of St. Paul’s conversion ?” 

‘‘ Yes, sir,” answered Unity, in surprise. 


NOT ACCORDING TO THE PATTERN. 259 

‘‘ Well, did you ever notice that after the 
light flashed upon him and the wonderful 
voice had called him, he did not say, ‘ Now 
I will arise and go and work like Peter and 
J ohn ’ ? He said, ‘ Lord, what wilt thou have 
me to do V And he never was set at Peter’s 
work, nor John’s, either; he did not live their 
life, nor die their death. I do not doubt 
that your cousin’s life and her work are 
beautiful and useful : I am glad to hear of 
it, as I am glad to hear of any one any- 
where who is a loyal subject to our King; 
but if the Lord had wanted only Flora’s 
work, he would have called only her; and 
he has called you. Don’t make a mistake, 
my child. Christ is the only perfect Pattern, 
and he never says to any of us, ‘ Follow this 
one,’ or ‘ Follow that one,’ but to each one of 
us, personally, ‘ Follow thou me.’ ” 

If even yet Unity did not fully com- 
prehend the truth he would have taught 
her, at least his words helped to turn her 
steps in the right direction. 


CHAPTER XII. 


**AS WHEN A STANDAED-BEAREB FAINTETHP 

F LORA’S letters had not given all the 
help Unity had expected from them. 
Possibly no letters could have done so, since 
the wisdom of others can be neither proffered 
nor accepted with the confidence with which 
we secure ready-made clothing — certain meas- 
urements given and a fit guaranteed. But 
during the latter part of the winter and 
through the spring Flora’s letters were sug- 
gestive of a mind preoccupied. They were 
shorter, she spoke of being very busy — 
though the business seemed to consist in 
going about a great deal — and she often 
forgot to answer Unity’s questions. But 
one early May day came a missive that 
explained. Flora was to be married in two 
or three weeks — the date had not yet been 
exactly settled because of a little uncertain- 
ty about the steamer they wished to take for 
260 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETHT 261 

Europe — and Una must without fail come 
and remain with her until she went away. 

“I suppose this announcement will not 
greatly surprise you/’ Flora wrote, “after 
what you saw and heard while here (though 
you did not become very well acquainted 
whh Mr. Kinley, I believe) and the hints 
my letters have contained. But congratu- 
lations sent by mail will not answer me, 
Una dear : I want your own loving self. 
I have so many things to tell you that I 
have neither time nor words to write, and 
I cannot do without you. You are almost 
my sister, and I must have you with me 
for the little time longer I remain at home. 
Now, don’t think of any objections, dear. 
I have written to Uncle Dodge about it — 
or rather mamma has done so, which will 
be more effectual — and we all expect you.” 

The letter dropped from Unity’s hands 
and for a few minutes lay unnoticed in 
her lap with its closing sentences unread. 
Surprise scarcely expressed her astonishment, 
almost her consternation. She had not even 
dreamed of this, whatever Flora had imag- 
ined concerning her knowledge. Mr. Kinley, 


262 


UNITY DODGE. 


the man whom Lester so disliked and de- 
spised, whom he openly called selfish, avari- 
cious and dishonest, to win Flora, whose 
hopes and aspirations were so pure and high, 
whose whole life was upon so lofty a plane ! 
So incredible did the intelligence appear that 
Unity could not have given it credence upon 
anything less than her cousin’s own word ; 
and, with that before her, she sat in silent 
amazement. 

But presently the apparent impossibility of 
it all suggested a new thought : Mr. Kinley 
might have greatly changed in his views and 
life since the few occasions Una had had 
of becoming acquainted with him. What 
might not Flora’s potent influence and all 
the charm of her beautiful example have 
wrought? Drawn first by love of her to 
attend the services she frequented, and then 
impressed and convinced by what he heard 
there, why should he not have changed and 
a new and sacred bond of sympathy have 
taken the place of the old friendship which 
Flora could have cherished only in the hope 
of doing him good ? 

A long breath of relief followed! this 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETHr 263 

suggestion, and Unity smiled at her own 
stupidity in not sooner reaching so natural 
a solution of the problem. Doubtless this 
whole story was among the many things 
Flora wanted to tell her. There was still 
a little pain at the thought that, in a certain 
sense, she must lose Flora. They could not 
be to each other quite what they had been 
in the old girlish days, but she could still 
rejoice in her cousin’s joy ; and she longed 
to go to her. She doubted, however, whether 
that would not be considered unreasonable, 
if not impossible, by other members of the 
family less interested. 

Dr. Dodge came down to dinner that day 
with some of the old scornful fire in his 
eyes, seldom seen there of late. Mrs. Dodge’s 
letter had proved effectual, though in a man- 
ner different from that which she had in- 
tended. 

“ Your aunt wants you to come to Flora’s 
wedding,” he remarked, looking toward his 
daughter. “ She pays a variety of compli- 
ments and says a great many kind things, 
and then very delicately proposes to pay 
your expenses. It is done up in all the new- 


264 


UNITY DODGE. 


fangled ruffles and fringes of words, but the 
long and the short of it is she thinks I’m 
too poor to send you, I suppose. Tom’s folks 
have always lived in all the style and fashion 
and nonsense of the age, and they have no 
idea that anybody else could refuse to do the 
same except on account of poverty. They 
can’t appreciate such a motive as common 
sense. I think I can show my lady sister- 
in-law that I am able to pay a few dollars 
for traveling expenses, even if I have not 
chosen to rig up my house with a cupola 
and a mortgage on top. Let me know what 
you need. Unity, and you shall have it.” 

‘^Dear me!” said Mrs. John, forestalling 
Unity’s delighted thanks ; I wouldn’t take 
so much trouble to convince her. If Unity 
doesn’t go, she will know she isn’t so short of 
money as to want hers.” 

‘‘ Unity is going,” interposed the old 
doctor, decidedly, unless she says she does 
not want to go.” 

Which Unity did not say. She looked up 
with a radiant face which all E-hoda’s after 
reflections and comments could not cloud. 

‘‘Because a girl doesn’t come out in all 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETHr 265 

the frippery and nonsense that most young 
simpletons wear,' they think she cannot 
afford to have any pleasures at all, I sup- 
pose. Well!’’ 

The doctor dismissed the subject with that 
last contemptuous ejaculation ; and when, 
two or three days later. Unity timidly went 
to him with a statement of the articles re- 
quired and the sum that would be needed — 
a very modest one she had made it — she 
found it difficult to arouse him to any re- 
membrance of the occurrence. He looked 
up dreamily ; 

Your cousin Flora’s wedding ? My 
dear child, I did not know she was mar- 
ried.” 

But Bhoda, in her vexation at the whole 
project, proved an unintentional but effect- 
ive ally : 

‘‘Well, I shouldn’t have supposed you’d 
forget Mrs. Dodge’s letter so soon, if you 
cared so much about it as to think it worth 
while for Unity to go on that account. I 
never thought it was any use to notice it, 
for my part.” 

“Letter? Mrs. Dodge?” The doctor’s 


266 


UNITY DODGE. 


bewildered brow slowly cleared. “ Yes, yes! 
I recollect. — What was 'it you said you 
wanted, child ?” 

Ehoda closed the door with considerable 
emphasis, as the baby’s crying called her 
away ; and Unity, with flushed cheeks, 
repeated her statement. She would not her- 
self have reawakened in her father’s mind the 
prejudice that she could not but feel was an 
unjust one, and she was sorry and some- 
what ashamed to feel that her unexpected 
indulgence was due even in part to such a 
motive. But she well knew how useless it 
would be to attempt to explain ; so she only 
accepted with quiet thanks the money placed 
in her hand. 

“ But you did not mean to give me this, 
father ?” she asked, pausing as she smoothed 
out the bills in her lap and held up one of 
them. ‘‘ It is a ten instead of a one.” 

“ Is it ? Let me see.” He took the note 
and carried it to the window, turning it 
one way and another and scrutinizing it 
carefully. ‘‘ So it is. This room is so 
dark I can scarcely see in it any more ex- 
cept by sitting close to the window. And 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW’ 267 

we have had so many cloudy and gloomy 
days lately.” 

Unity looked up in momentary surprise. 
She thought it had been a week of remark- 
ably bright sunshine, but she reflected how 
unlikely it was that her father should re- 
member from one day to another what the 
weather had been. As she went away to 
her own room with the little roll of money 
in her hand, she wondered whether she were 
reall}’’ selfish in determining upon this visit, 
which was so evidently viewed with dissatis- 
faction by Rhoda. 

‘‘True, I was away only last year, but 
that has been the only time in all my life, 
and since Rhoda came here she has been 
several times to see her people,” she reasoned. 
“ It is the last opportunity I shall have of 
visiting Flora in her old home, and probably 
I shall never go again. If I can be with 
her now and hear all about it from herself, 
I shall know so much more of what her 
new life is to be than letters can ever tell 
me.” 

But the long talk that followed Unity’s 
arrival was scarcely what she had expected. 


268 


UNITY DODGE. 


It seemed natural enough now that Lester 
should meet her at the station; but Lester 
was in a decidedly cynical mood, and from 
almost his first words it was evident that his 
dislike for his prospective brother-in-law had 
in no wise diminished. 

‘‘ So you have really come to the ‘ Great 
Clearing-Out Sale,’ have you?” he asked, 
then colored under her glance. “ I beg your 
pardon, Una. I suppose it is abominable to 
talk in that style, but I have been too cross to 
be particularly choice in my words for the 
last week — since this thing has been definite- 
ly settled. You know of my admiration for 
Mr. Kinley.” 

“ But I hoped you would have reason to 
think differently of him by this time ?” 
Unity half questioned, with eager voice and 
eyes. 

Well, I haven’t. And this whole ar- 
rangement seems to me such an exceeding- 
ly worldly-wise bargain that I begin to think 
money can buy anything.” 

‘‘It could not buy Flora,” answered Unity, 
decidedly. 

“Oh, I do Flo the justice to believe she 









y.'jcwx' 

wV^W 






Unity visits the city again 


I'age 268 



STANDAED-BBABBB FAIJVTBTJI.” 269 

has persuaded herself that she cares for him, 
and that he has a great many fine qualities, 
and all that sort of thing. Nevertheless, if 
it had not been for the costly setting, I think 
she would have been very slow to discover 
any jewel in that locality. How she can do 
this, if she cares so much for some other 
things and thinks them so vital as she has 
always pretended, is beyond my comprehen- 
sion. But I’ve given up trying to under- 
stand it.” 

‘‘ Uncle and aunt are satisfied with it ? 
I supposed so, from aunt’s letter,” said 
Unity. 

Lester looked at her with a quick, short 
laugh : 

“Did you stay so many weeks at our 
house without learning that whatever Flora 
does is right ? Mr. Kinley is ‘ very suscepti- 
ble to good influences,’ you know. Living 
in this benighted land, he can but seldom 
have enjoyed them ; but now he is to be 
brought under their constant pressure, and 
what may they not do for him ? I verily 
believe Flora half deludes herself with the 
idea that she is entering upon a sort of 


270 


UNITY DODGE, 


missionary work. You may think I have 
no right to speak in this way,” he added, 
with a sudden change of tone, ‘‘ but I have 
a right to care something for my only sister ; 
and I do care a good deal for her — entirely 
too much to have any patience with such 
a marriage as this. But it’s no use talking 
about it now.” 

Flora did not look like one to be com- 
miserated when she met her cousin with a 
radiant face. A very bright face it was still, 
an hour or two later, when she had, as she 
said, “ smuggled Una away from the rest for 
a good quiet talk” in the room they were 
to occupy together. She had much to tell 
of all their new plans and the prospects 
opening before her, of their trip to Europe 
and all the places they intended to visit : 

“ Just think of it, Una ! All those won- 
derful places I have dreamed of so long! 
I can hardly make myself believe I am 
really to see them at last. We shall be 
away for six or eight months — possibly a 
year. A delightful year I do not doubt it 
will be. And yet do you know” — Flora 
leaned her head back against the cushions 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW* 271 

of her chair and looked at her cousin with 
a tender softening of the bright blue eyes — 
‘‘ I can begin to imagine already that I shall 
be glad to get home again and take up my 
work once more?’’ 

“ Your home will be here ?” questioned 
Unity. 

“ In the city ? Yes. Mr. Kinley has a 
lovely place near the Park and Flora 
launched into praises of its beauty, its 
grounds, its drives and fountains, and then 
of the grand house with its beautiful rooms. 
“It will be very different, of course, from 
anything to which I have been accustomed. 
Not that I haven’t always had everything 
comfortable,” with a complacent glance 
around the pretty room, “ but not like that. 
It will be new to me, Una, and wealth 
brings great responsibility,” she added, with 
a gentle gravity stealing into her face and 
voice. “But how much good it may be 
made to accomplish !” 

“ In the right hands — in yours,” assented 
Unity, eagerly ; for in all this there had 
been nothing of what she most wished to 
hear, unless, indeed, this last sentence touched 


272 


UNITY DODGE. 


upon it. ‘‘And Mr. Kinley will sympathize 
with you in such things, and help you?” 
A blundering question bluntly asked, it 
seemed to her; but at least her thought 
had found expression. 

Flora understood it, and the fair brow 
clouded. 

“ Dear Una, can there be perfect happiness 
in this world?” she answered, gently. “You 
have touched upon the only spot that mars 
mine. In some ways Mr. Kinley is not all 
that I could wish. He is not a Christian, 
you know, and so he cannot feel as I do 
about many things. He has been unfor- 
tunately educated, but I hope his views will 
greatly change when he is really in a home 
of his own — when we are constantly together. 
He promises, of course, that I shall be 
entirely free to follow my own convictions ; 
and, indeed, he says that I am the only link 
between him and those sacred things which 
are so much to me. Think of it, Una! What 
a sweet, awful responsibility ! The only 
link I” 

It was Flora who was speaking, but for 
Unity her words had suddenly lost their 


'‘A STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW^ 273 

weight. The sweet voice rippled on, but she 
scarcely heard the rest of its confidences. 
It sounded far off and more meaningless 
than the wind. How could two agree to 
walk together, when they were going in op- 
posite directions ? If love and faith and the 
Master’s service were indeed, as they had 
always seemed. Flora’s very life, how could 
she link that life with one who utterly dis- 
believed in and rejected them? If she 
really held these things to be of supreme 
importance, how could she have chosen for 
her dearest earthly friend, whose lot in 
life she would share, one who cared nothing 
for them ? What part could he have in her 
brightest hopes, her deepest feelings, her 
most earnest purposes? And if he shared 
none of these, what attraction or tie had 
Flora found that she dignified by the name 
of “ love,” unless it were in truth the glitter- 
ing one that Lester had suggested ? 

Unity’s hands had dropped in her lap, 
and it was a grave, still face that she turned 
toward her cousin while she mentally tried 
to solve the tangled, painful problem. It 
was this same low, gentle voice that had 
18 


274 


VNITY DODGE. 


first taught her “ all the words of this life.” 
And was it not real to Flora herself, after 
all ? or was it that the world and its treas- 
ures were so much more real and valuable to 
her than she had supposed ? 

‘‘ But you haven’t manifested the least cu- 
riosity about my trousseau,” laughed Flora. 
“A part of it has come home — not the dress 
yet, of course — and some beautiful presents 
have been sent in already. Isn’t it nonsense 
to make such a fuss and buy such a quantity 
of things, as if there would never be a chance 
to make a purchase afterward ? Come ! I’ll 
show them to you.” 

As Lester had said, it was ‘‘ no use talking 
about it now,” and Unity arose and followed 
Flora to the room where wardrobe and gifts 
were accumulating. She tried to praise the 
beauty that she would have been quick to 
discover under other circumstances, but her 
manner was so constrained that finally there 
dawned upon Flora an uncomfortable sus- 
picion that Unity, in whom she had never 
before discovered a trace of the feeling, was 
really a little envious ; and she quietly 
pushed aside a case Mr. Kinley had sent her 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETHP 275 

the day before, and charitably refrained from 
displaying its contents — a set of pearls and 
sapphires. 

But Unity viewed all the display as, a 
little later, she viewed the bridal ceremony 
and its attendant splendors — with a sadly 
troubled heart. Even Flora’s low, persuasive 
tones could not hush the voice of conscience 
or make her deaf to its honest verdict, and 
she had now nothing to say to Lester’s 
comment : 

‘‘Oh yes, it is a beautiful arrangement! 
Mr. Kinley will make plenty of money by 
sharp practice and unscrupulous means, and 
Flo will spend a little of it in charity and 
think she is doing great good.” 

Unity was sad and weary with it all, and 
glad when it was over and she could go 
home. If she had not cared so much for 
Flora, had not deemed her so nearly per- 
fect, she might still have felt surprise and 
disapproval ; but now the disappointment 
was overwhelming. She was dismayed and 
bewildered. 

“ Well, if I were to judge from your looks, 
I should say you had been to a funeral rather 


276 


UNITY DODGE. 


than to a wedding,” was Rhoda’s criticism the 
day after her return. 

“And I feel so,” Unity whispered to her- 
self, though, beyond a faint smile, her lips 
made no reply. She could not force herself 
into any animated account of the occasion 
and its surroundings, yet she tried to do it 
to gratify her sister-in-law, who expected 
at least a full description as a compensation 
for the visit to which she had objected. 

So miserable a failure was the effort that 
Rhoda was firmly established in her con- 
viction that the trip had been useless — 
money thrown away. 

“It doesn’t seem to me that you know 
much more about it than you would have 
known if you had stayed here and only 
heard through letters,” she said. “ I thought 
you would bring home pieces of her dresses, 
anyhow, and it wouldn’t have hurt them 
any to have sent some of the cake. I’ll 
warrant, if I’d been there, I’d have known 
a little more about what was given her and 
what she wore. Why, child, what did you 
go for?” 

The interest and the meaning — the new 


*‘A STAJVDAEB-jBFABFB FAINTFTII.'* 277 

meaning which had made it sweet — seemed 
to Unity suddenly to have gone out of her 
life. She had been trying to fashion her 
character after a beautiful model, and the 
model had all at once proved not worth 
imitating. Had it? She abruptly asked 
herself the question when that thought fully 
presented itself. What was it that she had 
been trying to do ? She took up her Bible. 
The old sweet promises were still there ; the 
Master was still worth following. Almost 
his voice seemed asking reproachfully, “Will 
ye also go away ?” Laying her face on the 
book, she answered in Peter’s words : “ Lord, 
to whom shall we go ? Thou hast the words 
of eternal life.” Yes, she was sure of that ; 
and yet the one who first had induced her 
to listen to those words, who had told her 
of the love that would bless and gladden 
all her life and had taught her that all 
earthly treasures were as nothing compared 
with this friendship and service, had counted 
those same earthly treasures as of greater 
worth, and had eagerly snatched at them 
when they were within her grasp. She had 
given them the prominent place in the most 


278 


UNITY DODGE. 


important choice of her life. Had Flora 
been so blinded and dazzled that she did 
not clearly see what she was doing, or had 
she never really believed what she had 
taught to others ? Could she have felt and 
believed all these things and yet have 
chosen as she had ? 

Unity’s brain as well as her heart ached 
with the perplexing questions that now in 
one form, now in another, so constantly re- 
peated themselves. She could not banish 
them, she could not settle them ; and she 
grew sadly wearied and worn. She had not 
parted with her faith, but she had lost heart 
and courage. Unconsciously she had been 
following a human guide, and her guide had 
failed her. Her lonely, hungry heart had 
so clung to Flora ! all her life had seemed 
to bloom and brighten at the coming of this 
one friendship; and now she had lost it. 
Not that her cousin’s manner had been less 
tender and affectionate through all that last 
visit, nor that letters written in the old 
endearing way were not still sent by her; 
but Unity felt that the Flora whom she had 
so trusted, so reverenced, was dead, or, worse. 


“A STANBABD-BBAEEE FAINTETM^ 279 

had never existed. ^‘To make idols and 
find them clay, and to bewail their wor- 
ship — ” It is an old story, but Unity did 
not know it. She could not put her sorrow 
far enough away from her to analyze it; 
she only knew that all her hopes and all 
her plans seemed to have grown dull and 
spiritless. She tried faithfully to do the 
duties that fell to her, but old occupations 
had lost their zest and labor its incentive. 

Unity drooped so visibly that even Hhoda 
noticed it, though it was one of the few 
things she would have preferred not to 
notice. She placed her own construction 
upon it, and concerning its cause judged as 
correctly as it was in her nature to do. 

“ She’s moping herself sick because Flora 
is married, that’s all,” she informed John. 
‘‘It has been ‘Dear Una’ and ‘Dear Flora’ 
for these two or three years, and they have 
written long letters to each other, and have 
been as crazy to get each one as if it held 
a fortune ; and now Flora has found some- 
body else that she cares more for, and Unity 
feels jealous and deserted. It is always the 
way with such red-hot friendships. I never 


280 


UNITY DODGE. 


was romantic enough to have any of them 
myself, but I used to watch other girls. 
They always end that way. Unity’ll soon 
forget it. What she needs is plenty of 
work to take up her mind.” 

Warren thought differently. He was 
home for a day or two, and at first he 
silently watched his sister’s changed face 
and listless manner ; then he spoke to 
John : 

“ What is the matter with Unity ?” 

“I don’t know. Nothing, I guess. Rho- 
da thinks she’s sort of fretting because Flora 
has married and gone away. She’ll be all 
right when the spring work comes on.” 

“ I don’t think she has ever suffered from 
lack of work,” said Warren, decidedly ; and 
he seized the first opportunity to question 
Unity herself, doing it in his usual abrupt 
fashion : “You have changed since I was 
home last: what is wrong, Una?” 

“ I don’t know — myself, I’m afraid,” she 
answered, smiling faintly. Then the thought 
that had been slowly growing for weeks 
burst forth impetuously : “ Oh, Warren, I’m 
so tired of it all ! I don’t know whether it 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW^ 281 

is wrong or not, but I wish I could go away 
somewhere — to school. I wish I could study 
to be a teacher.’’ 

“Well, why shouldn’t you?” hesaid, slowly. 
“ I never thought of it before, but I don’t 
see why it might not be a good plan. You 
could be more independent. Of course this 
is your home, and you have a right here ; 
but you might like other work better. And 
then — It stands this way, Una.” He 
suddenly stopped commenting and began 
briefly to explain. “ You have some share 
in the property here — no great amount, but 
there is something that will some day be 
yours. It has all been in John’s hands, 
and he has done well enough with it ; I’ve 
nothing to say against that. But if you are 
sure that by and by you would rather have 
an education than more money or something 
else of that sort, why you are old enough 
to know your own mind. I think John and 
Bhoda can be brought to agree to it ; but if 
they won’t. I’ll help you myself. I could do 
it easy enough if it were not for — ” He 
looked at her a moment, as if hesitating 
whether to complete the sentence; but she 


282 


UNITY DODGE. 


asked no questions : she only said, with a 
grateful remembrance of the difference be- 
tween now and earlier years, 

‘‘ Oh, Warren, you are so good to me !” 

“ It is time somebody was,” he answered, 
with a little quick laugh, a flush stealing 
over his brown cheek, as if he were slightly 
embarrassed by the unexpected remark. “I 
don’t think our family, as a whole, have 
hurt themselves with taking care of one 
another.” 

*‘No.” It seemed odd to be speaking of 
this to Warren, but she was glad to have an 
opportunity to do it. “ I wish I had known 
about such things earlier. Maybe I might 
have helped — a little — to have made home 
pleasanter for you and poor Eeub.” She 
hesitated over the last words, and spoke 
them in a low tone. 

Warren looked at her earnestly for a 
moment : 

“ Reub is — ” Then he changed the sen- 
tence : “ I think it was all that a little mite 
like you could do to make things tolerable 
for yourself — more than you could do, in 
fact. But about a school : I wish there was 


“4 STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW* 283 

one in Waynesdale, but there is not. How 
would Glenn University do?’’ 

Warren was going straight forward in 
his determined way to plan out details before 
Unity could persuade herself to believe that 
the project was possible in any guise. He 
brought the matter promptly to a crisis 
by calmly remarking to his father at the 
table : 

“ Unity has been telling me that she wants 
to go away to school. What do you think 
of the Glenn University?” 

No one of the party was more startled 
than Unity herself. The audacity of the 
proceeding seemed to her unparalleled, and 
for a few minutes she scarcely knew what 
passed around her, until she heard her father 
say in answer to some one, 

“ Well, if the child likes study, it is 
natural enough. I always loved books.” 

“If Una’s work here is worth only her 
board and her clothing, I suppose you can 
easily get some one else to do it for the 
same,” said Warren, apparently pursuing a 
discussion with his brother; “so you need 
suffer no loss by her going away.” 


284 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘Yes; I suppose that is true,” admitted 
John, brightening a little at that suggestion 
as he remembered how often E,hoda had 
complained of Unity ^s lack of strength and 
ability. “ If she wants to use part of what’s 
coming to her that way — Well, it’s taking 
out ready money, and that’s not easy to 
spare now. Still, it could be managed, a 
little at a time. I’m not saying it isn’t fair 
enough, only — ” He glanced doubtfully at 
his wife. Her black brows were contracted 
in an unmistakable frown. Whatever she 
might think of her young sister-in-law’s 
ability, as compared with her own, to “ turn 
off a day’s work,” she perfectly well knew 
that Unity’s knowledge of the household 
routine, her interest and faithfulness in all 
that concerned it and her untiring devo- 
tion to little Jack could not be procured 
for money. 

“She went to school in the village as 
long as she wanted to go there — at least, 
as long as it was any use for her to go 
there — and I don’t see what more she needs,” 
said Mrs. Rhoda, sharply. “ It is very easy 
to talk about what share this one and that 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW^ 285 

one is entitled to now, since John has 
taken the place and made something of it. 
There’d have been little enough for any- 
body but for that.’’ 

“ J ohn has done well with the place, and 
we all owe him thanks for it. If we had 
not sense enough to see it when we were 
younger, we certainly can now,” said War- 
ren, with a quick glance at his brother. 

It was the most unexpected remark War- 
ren could have made, and John’s look gradu- 
ally changed from surprise to pleasure as he 
slowly comprehended. The commendation 
was only just. He had done well with the 
place ; and if he had closely held all he 
made, and had been slow to consider the 
others in their wishes and their interests, it 
was because he was so intent upon his own, 
so desirous of making the most of every- 
thing within his grasp, rather than because 
of any intentional injustice. He had never 
an idea of defrauding his brothers and sister, 
but only of turning them to the best account, 
as he viewed it, while they were under his 
management, without cherishing the slightest 
doubt that his management would be as good 


286 


VNITY DODGE. 


for them as for the farm. Warren could see 
all that more clearly now than in the days 
when he had been so fretted and chafed by 
opposition and restraint. 

But we could not all have done so well/’ 
Warren pursued, with an amicable glance 
at Bhoda, “ and that some of us are better 
fitted for other work than farming doesn’t 
need much proof. We are not so rich but 
that we shall all need to work in some way, 
and it is only fair that Una should have a 
chance for a better education if she wants it.” 

“ No ; I can’t say but that’s so — if in that 
way she wants to use a part of what’ll be- 
long to her, and if father is willing,” admit- 
ted John, with a glance wandering question- 
ingly from his wife to his father. 

“ No, no ! I don’t object,” answered the 
old doctor, but with his head dropping on 
his hands, as if he were weary of objecting 
or consenting to most things in this world. 

For the first time Unity noticed how gray 
the bowed head was growing — noticed, but 
did not think of it until afterward. There 
was some further discussion, but the question 
of her going to the university was settled, in- 


STANDARD-BEARER FAINTETW^ 287 

credible as it seemed to her, in the affirm- 
ative. 

“I don’t know how to thank you,” she said, 
gratefully, to Warren afterward. ‘‘Some 
way,” looking up at him timidly, “ I think 
you are different from what you used to 
be.” 

“ I should hope so.” He laughed a little. 
“I think you are different too. Suppose” — 
he hesitated a moment over the proposition 
— “ that you and I write to each other after 
you are settled at Glenn and see if we can 
get better acquainted?” 

“ Will you ?” said Unity, eagerly. “ Oh, 
Warren, I’d be so glad !” Letters from her 
cousin had grown to seem natural enough, 
but she had never thought of writing to her 
brother, or that he would care to hear from 
her. 


CHAPTEE XIII. 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 

L etters were not set down in the cur- 
riculum at Glenn University, yet perhaps 
they constituted a more potent and valuable 
factor in Unity’s education while there than 
any of the branches so named. She had 
dreaded the first plunge into her new life. 
Her girlhood had not fostered self-reliance, 
and she shrank from going alone among 
strangers to make all the necessary inquiries 
and arrangements; but she had not hoped 
to escape such an ordeal until, on the day 
of departure, Warren unexpectedly appeared 
and announced himself in readiness to ac- 
company her. It occurred to her that day 
as she watched his modest, manly, straight- 
forward manner when in conversation with 
some of the professors at the college, and 
afterward on their round in search of suit- 
able lodgings, that this was a very agreeable 
288 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 289 

brother for a girl to own, and her heart 
thrilled with the first sisterly pride it had 
ever known. 

By his careful inquiries and persistent 
effort, Unity at last found herself in very 
pleasant quarters and able to enter auspi- 
ciously upon her new work. She began it 
eagerly. Languor had vanished with the 
opening of this new vista, and strength and 
cheerfulness rapidly returned with the coin- 
ing of fresh hopes and interests. She still 
mourned over Flora, but there was some- 
thing definite for herself to do apart from 
the old mechanical round that had busied 
only her hands. She could not satisfactori- 
ly settle the problem of her cousin’s course, 
but more profitable studies crowded it more 
and more out of her thoughts and allowed 
her mind to regain a healthful tone. 

As soon as Unity was fairly settled in her 
course of studies and began to feel a sense 
of proprietorship in the quiet little room at 
the house where she boarded, she wrote to 
Warren. She began the correspondence 
timidly. Would he like to hear about this ? 
Would he think it silly to write that ? she 

19 


290 


VNITY DODGE. 


wondered. But after tearing up one or two 
rather stiff attempts, she grew desperate. 

It sounds as if it were copied from the 
Complete Letter -Writer that Bhoda always 
keeps on the parlor-table at home,” she 
laughed, though with the tears coming to 
her eyes. ‘‘ Oh dear ! I’d like to tell some- 
body — somebody that would really care — 
about all the little things here. I believe 
I will write them to him just as if I ex- 
pected him to be interested.” 

The answer surprised her. Warren found 
it easier to speak freely upon paper than 
face to face. There were many things he 
had wanted to say to some one — some one 
who knew all about the old life, and so 
could understand — of new hopes, ambitions 
and plans ; and when once he began to 
write, he forgot all constraint and wrote 
more freely than he had expected or in- 
tended. His nature had been like an ice- 
bound stream, seemingly dull, cold and 
hard, simply because there had never been 
in his home sufficient sunshine of love to 
melt the surface crusts and reveal the cur- 
rents beneath. 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 291 

That letter was a revelation to Unity. 
From it she learned more of her brother’s 
feelings and purposes, more of himself, than 
she had ever known before. She read it 
with grateful tears and a new sweet sense of 
wealth. At last she was “ like other girls;” 
she had a brother who loved and cared for 
her. There was no trouble in replying. 
Warren’s letter had opened a world of 
thoughts and questions. From that time 
the correspondence became regular, growing 
constantly more unreserved, tender and 
helpful. 

It awoke Unity to new strength, endeav- 
or and achievement. A woman is seldom 
ambitious except for love’s sake. But that 
which she would never demand or aspire to 
for herself she will eagerly claim and win 
for her mother’s daughter, her brother’s 
sister, her husband’s wife. God, who 
setteth the solitary in families,” knows us 
full well. Could the Master have offered 
surer inducement than “ Whosoever shall do 
the will of God, the same is my brother, and 
my sister, and mother ” ? 

So Unity’s school-life prospered ; and as 


292 


UNITY DODGE. 


weeks passed into months they found her 
not only pursuing with steadily-increas- 
ing interest the paths opening before her, 
but also growing out of her timid, repressed 
dreamy girlhood into a more healthful and 
active life. The circle of school associates, 
the new society as well as new duties, 
wrought each their work. Nevertheless, as 
has been said, Warren’s letters were an im- 
portant factor in the change and improve- 
ment, since she gained from them new zest 
and energy. It was as his sister Una that 
she delighted in winning her way to high 
rank in her classes and in taking a respected 
place in the social circle of her college world. 
She would have employed her time and her 
advantages conscientiously in any case, but 
duty became a joy when somebody cared. 

There were other letters which came in 
those days, though not so regularly. From 
abroad Flora wrote glowing descriptions of 
places and scenery, bright bits of travel with 
gentle moralizing and some sound and wise 
reflections interspersed. Unity read them 
with a peculiar smile, and often dropped 
them in her lap for a long puzzled reverie. 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 


293 


But as time passed she was able to enjoy 
them more for just what they were, without 
seeking to read between the lines or to find 
what never could be there. Her answers 
were slow and brief. She could not find 
much to say — much that she cared to say — 
in reply, and there were long lapses in the 
correspondence. 

While the journeying lasted Flora seemed 
scarcely to notice this, but another year, when 
she was at home again and wrote to her 
cousin as of old about her numerous plans, 
she missed the accustomed ready sympathy 
and gently complained that Unity was allow- 
ing her studies to crowd everything else from 
her mind. 

“ Cultivating the mind is all right, dear, 
but be careful not to do it at the expense of 
heart and soul,” she counseled. “ I cannot 
bear to feel that you are losing interest in 
any of those things for which once you cared 
so much.” 

Flora had been giving an account of the 
mission schools and her own reorganized 
classes, and Unity smiled as she read the 
closing admonition. A little sadness, some 


294 


UNITY DODGE. 


pity for Flora, for herself and for poor 
human nature generally, the smile expressed, 
but there was no longer any bitterness in it. 
She began to understand that the Flora who 
had been so earnest and devout was not 
necessarily a sham, nor the Flora who had 
been dazzled by Mr. Kinley’s wealth and 
position consciously a recreant. Both were 
only parts of an imperfect and inconsistent 
whole, not a faultless pattern to be copied. 
This cousin had taught and helped her much 
in the days gone by, and gratitude and 
affection awoke again now that the bitter- 
ness of her disappointment had passed and 
she could judge more clearly. But she 
could not write on those topics to Flora 
quite in the old way ; and, in truth, what 
Flora missed and wanted was not so much 
sympathy with and interest in her work 
as the old admiration for herself and her 
doings. 

Letters from home were infrequent and 
not very communicative. Bhoda was not 
an adept at correspondence, and John de- 
clared that he would rather do a day s work 
ploughing than write a letter of friendship. 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 


295 


“ In a letter of business one could say what 
had to be said and stop/’ but a letter that 
had to be studied up to give all the news 
and everything of that kind was entirely 
too much trouble for him. So the burden 
fell upon E-hoda, and she postponed it as long 
as possible and then wrote, “Your father and 
all of us are as well as usual,” reported the 
condition of the weather with almanac-like 
brevity, added a few statistics concerning 
the pounds of butter she had made this 
week and the pounds of butter made last 
week — throwing in an item about a visit 
from Dely or the colds and tumbles of little 
Jack and Baby — and closing with the self- 
evident “ No more at present.” 

These epistles were difficult to answer, as 
they suggested neither question nor comment; 
and Unity knew that any account of her 
studies would be far less interesting to Eho- 
da than were the rolls of butter to herself. 
The home-letters were chiefly valuable for 
what they did not contain, by their lack of 
startling intelligence intimating that every- 
thing was moving on in the accustomed 
way. 


296 


UNITY DODGE. 


In her brief vacations at home, however, 
Unity thought her father had changed. 
His hair had grown grayer, but that added 
less to his appearance of age than did his 
bent figure and his slow, uncertain step. 

Why, no, he isn’t sick ; I don’t see that 
he looks much older,” said Rhoda, to whom 
she spoke of it. “It’s more that his eye- 
sight has failed than anything else. He has 
used his eyes over those books till it’s no 
wonder. And he says himself that his 
spectacles are poor. No, he hasn’t changed 
much, only you haven’t seen him lately.” 

Dr. Dodge asked Unity a few questions 
about her classes and branches of study — 
the only ones that were asked at home — 
and she wondered, as she watched him turn 
and grope his way slowly up the stairs, if 
that dingy upper room and his work in it 
really occupied all his head and heart, or 
whether the old house had grown any lone- 
lier to him as its inmates went out from it 
one by one. She wished she could know 
whether he had missed her or cared to have 
her at home. 

The old gentleman manifested his re- 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 297 

merabrance of her presence in an unex- 
pected manner that evening by suddenly 
turning to her when he had opened the 
Bible for family worship : 

‘‘Child, I wish you would read for me 
to-night. I can hardly make out the words 
by this dim lamp, and these glasses are 
wretchedly defective. They make poor 
glasses nowadays. I must try again and 
get stronger ones.’' 

Bhoda’s eyes opened wide at the remark, 
and she glanced curiously from one to the 
other as Unity took the book and with deep- 
ening color, but without hesitation, turned to 
the Gospels and read : 

“ Let not your heart be troubled ; ye 
believe in God, believe also in me.” 

Whether her father noticed the deviation 
from the ordinary reading. Unity did not 
know ; he made no comment. She wrote to 
Warren of the change which she saw or 
fancied in her father. 

But the reply so surprised and over- 
whelmed her — though it was but the an- 
swer to many prayers from One who has 
surely promised to answer — that for the 


298 


UNITY DODGE. 


time it banished from her mind all thought 
of the communication which had called it 
forth. 

I often wonder,” Warren wrote, “whether 
father did really cast off Reub so entirely 
and irrevocably as he would have it appear, 
or whether, after all, he does not mourn over 
him and want to hear from him. I some- 
times fancy he does, and that it may have 
troubled him more than we think. I do not 
know that he has ever tried to learn any- 
thing about him — or how much he thinks 
about any of us, for that matter. But I can 
remember him 'as you cannot — years ago, be- 
fore this study began, while mother lived ; 
and he cared for his children then. 

“The truth is, Una, Beub is here with 
me, and has been for three years; and he 
is doing well too. I never really lost sight 
of him, and when I learned — it is too long 
a story to tell just how — that he had been 
hurt, but was still with the circus company, 
I got away for a day or two, went after him 
and brought him back. It did not take 
much persuasion, for he was thoroughly 
disgusted with the sort of life he had been 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM, 299 

leading. He stayed with me until he was 
well enough to work, and then we had not 
much trouble in finding a good place for 
him. He is in a printing-office here, likes 
the work, and they like him. Lately we 
have so arranged it that we can board at 
the same place, and we have as cozy a little 
room as need be. 

“ Maybe I ought to have told you all this 
before ; but at first I did not think any one 
else cared for poor E.eub as I did, and after- 
ward, when he told me about your visiting 
him, he said, ‘Don’t tell any one about 
me until there is something respectable to 
tell.’ 

“ I can scarcely explain how a wrong 
thing can be a good one, but I do believe 
E-eub’s going off in the way he did has 
really brought good — been overruled for 
good, I mean — both to him and to me. 
We had been growing more and more rest- 
less and discontented for a long time. Our 
home was not of the kind to hold or help 
a boy much, though I do not intend to 
blame any one by saying that. I began to 
spend my evenings away at first — not in the 


300 


UNITY DODGE. 


best company, either — and then I took Eeub 
with me ; and of course we were naturally 
sinking to the level of our associates. I 
might have grown dissipated, worthless, even 
criminal, by slow, and to myself almost im- 
perceptible, degrees; but Eeub developed a 
recklessness that startled me. I had helped 
to lead him into it, but I soon lost all con- 
trol of him and was no longer the leader. 
His course opened my eyes. I saw where 
he was going, and I was troubled and alarm- 
ed — all the more because I could not help 
feeling that I was in a great measure re- 
sponsible for it. I myself began to turn 
about then, but I could not influence him ; 
and you know how it ended. After he went 
away I determined to plan out some useful 
path for my own life, and to try to save it 
from ruin ; but doubtless I should have made 
poor enough work of it but for the Help I 
did not seek. Do you remember that even- 
ing when I went with you and Flora to the 
meeting and would not go in ? I only wan- 
dered around a block or two, and then back 
to the old church again. I could scarcely 
tell what impulse moved me. I said to 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 301 

myself that I was curious to know what 
amusement you girls could find in such 
a place, but it was a deeper feeling than 
curiosity. I was back in a dark corner by 
the door through nearly all the meeting, but 
I brought away only one sentence — at least, 
it crowded out all the rest : ‘ What shall it 
profit a man if he gain the whole world and 
lose his own soul V 

‘‘ You see, Una, no saying that I did not 
believe any one could tell exactly when the 
judgment-day would come, and that I did 
not think any one really understood all the 
prophecies in Kevelation, had any effect. 
This was nothing about times and figures 
that might be interpreted in different ways : 
it was just a plain, solemn, awful question. 
I knew that day would surely come, I could 
understand what losing my own soul must 
mean, and there could be only one answer 
to such a question of profit and loss. I tried 
to shake off the words, but they haunted me. 
They crossed every plan, they stood between 
me and every ambition, and at last they 
drove me to the Book I had not opened 
for years. Then the ‘Light’ fiashed upon 


302 


UNITY DODGE. 


me, growing clearer and brighter until it 
filled all my heart and life. 

“After that I grew still more anxious 
about Reub. How could I ever read or use 
that wonderful name ‘ our Elder Brother ’ 
without thinking what sort of an elder broth- 
er I had been to poor Reub ? I could not 
rest until I found him. 

“And now I wish I knew how father feels 
about it. I have feared to write or to speak 
to him lest it should bring an answer far 
worse than even this silence. Maybe it is 
wiser still to wait.’' 

Unity had no counsel to give upon that 
point. Her father had so positively forbid- 
den all mention of Beub’s name that she 
doubted how he would receive even this in- 
telligence. But presently she forgot that 
question in the joy to herself of knowing 
that he was safe, useful and contented. It 
seemed almost too good to be true, and she 
read the letter again and again. She had so 
prayed for this ! but when the blessing an- 
nounced itself at her door, she was like the 
praying church at Jerusalem when Peter 
stood knocking without — slow to believe that 


LETTERS AND A TELEGRAM. 303 

it was neither delusion nor vision, but the 
asked-for boon really granted. 

In her happiness Unity longed to tell 
some one; but it was not Flora, with her 
many schemes for aiding and restoring the 
wandering, to whom she wrote — even though 
she knew Flora would be sincerely glad to 
hear — but to Lester. One odd little sen- 
tence in his reply she pondered without 
being quite sure that she followed its mean- 
ing: 

I have nearly reached the conclusion, 
Una, that when one is in danger of ship- 
wreck it may not be wise to refuse a life- 
preserver simply because some other persons 
wear theirs awkwardly, or even because some 
are foolishly trusting to worthless imitations 
instead of securing the genuine article.” 

Very bright were those days to Unity. 
Warren and Feub came to visit her one 
Saturday, and they had a happy afternoon 
together in the quiet college town. She 
went back to her studies with the keen 
zest that only joy and hope can give. Every 
burden seemed lifting from her life, and she 
began to weave many pleasant plans for the 


304 


UNITY DODGE. 


future. She had entered upon her last 
year at the university. The boys must 
surely come when she graduated. How 
glad she should be to have some one there 
who cared — some of her very own ! Per- 
haps she could even persuade her father 
to come. It did not seem impossible, after 
what had already happened ; and then — 

But athwart all this happ}^ planning 
dropped one of those unexpected barriers 
that we call accident or providence, accord- 
ing to our mood. In one of those cheery, 
busy days a boy came to the house with a 
bit of paper — a boy from the telegraph office 
bringing a thin brown envelope: 

“ Bhoda was thrown from the wagon this 
morning and badly hurt. Come at once.” 

There was scant leavetaking and hasty 
packing, and then Unity was whirling away 
through the evening shadows in the cars, 
that for once seemed to move too slowly, 
while her imagination strove to supply all 
the details which the brief message had 
not given. 


CHAPTEE XIV. 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKEN NAMED 
RHODAr 

I T was strange to see Ehoda lying pale 
and helpless ; her very presence had al- 
ways suggested energy and activity. But it 
became evident, as the first excitement of 
the occurrence wore away and the visits of 
the neighbors gradually grew less frequent, 
while those of the physician continued, that 
this was a state of things not soon to be 
changed, and one to which they must all 
become accustomed. 

‘‘ Time,” said the doctor, in answer to his 
patient’s eager inquiries — ‘‘ time is about all 
we can prescribe now, and patience.” 

It was but a repetition of the remark 
Dr. Dodge had made an hour before, and 
Bhoda questioned rather querulously : 

“Well, but how much time? I’d like to 
know something about it. How long must 
I expect to lie here?” 

20 


305 


306 


UNITY DODGE. 


‘‘That is a difficult question to answer, 
Mrs. Dodge. I wouldn’t expect anything 
about it,” replied the doctor as calmly as 
if his .suggestion were practicable. “No 
one can tell exactly. An injury to the 
spine, you know — ” 

“ Doctor,” interrupted Dhoda, with a 
sudden terrible fear blanching cheek and 
lips, “you don’t mean — you can’t think — 
this is anything that will last, that I shall 
be helpless always?” 

“ Well, no ; I shouldn’t like to say that.” 
The doctor hesitated. “ Nature possesses 
wonderful power of recuperation, and it is 
impossible to say just how much we may 
hope for in such cases ; but they are tedious 
always. A severe spinal injury is a serious 
matter, and we must trust chiefly to time; 
but we may expect that you will soon suffer 
much less than at present, and — Yes, I 
think you should cherish hope of ultimate- 
ly recovering a tolerable degree of strength 
and health.” 

But Bhoda had turned her face to the 
wall, so that it could not be seen, and an- 
swered nothing. This was a bit of work 


DAMSEL CAME TO,HEARKENr 307 

that even she could not turn off in a hurry. 
Among all the busy planning and calcu- 
lating which had been her boast, she had 
never calculated for anything like this. 

Dr. Dodge explained to Unity more simply 
and explicitly than the other physician had 
done : 

‘‘ She was hurrying, as usual, and hurried 
too fast for once — turned a corner carelessly. 
That was the way it happened. It’s a won- 
der she wasn’t killed. And now it will be 
months at least — probably a year — before 
she can walk a step. She will never be 
the strong woman she has been ; that’s the 
long and short of it.” 

Which summing up of the case sent Unity 
up to her room to unpack and put away her 
books with the knowledge that her school- 
days were done. A few tears fell over the 
task and all that it represented, but she 
clearly saw that it was necessary and right. 
Her place was here at home. Ehoda was 
laid aside ; there were two little ones to be 
cared for, as well as the invalid. Then she 
had been shocked and surprised at the 
change visible in her father — a change of 


308 


UNITY DODGE. 


which no one had written her, because it 
had come so gradually that they had scarce- 
ly noticed it. The upper room and its books 
no longer devoured all his time. He wan- 
dered slowly up and down stairs, in and out 
of the house, and spent long hours sitting 
in the sunshine on the old porch. 

At first Unity thought that Rhoda’s illness 
and all the excitement attendant upon it had 
drawn him from his accustomed pursuits for 
a time ; but when she remarked upon it, 
Rhoda answered in the weak, half-fretful 
voice that was so unlike her brisk, deter- 
mined tones : 

‘‘Oh, there’s nothing wonderful about 
that; he hasn’t stayed up there very much 
for the last two months. He can’t see to 
pore over books the way he used to. I 
shouldn’t suppose he could, when lately he 
has twice asked me to tell him what things 
were when I passed them to him at the 
table. Dear me! I wonder when I shall 
be able to look after things again?” 

Unity looked out pityingly at the gray 
head bowed so silently in the sunlight, and 
dimly comprehended what it must be to 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEABKENr 309 

have the occupation of a lifetime taken 
away with nothing to fill the void. 

‘‘Father, you do not write and study 
now,” she said, resolved to learn the exact 
truth from himself. “ Is it because your 
eyes trouble you ?” 

Dr. Dodge turned his head a little at the 
sound of her voice : 

“Yes; I can only just make my way 
around now: that’s about all. Didn’t any- 
body tell you ? I thought John or Rhoda 
wrote to you now and then? Sometimes 
I can pick out half a page or so, if the print 
is very good ; sometimes I can’t do even 
that. I — I haven’t been able to finish what 
I wanted to do. I had to give it up.” The 
words ended in a sigh, and he left the porch 
and slowly walked down the lane to the 
gate. 

Unity looked after him anxiously. She 
had never thought of her father as needing 
love or pity, but perhaps he had needed 
them all these years. It scarcely seemed 
that his life could appear to him a very 
happy or successful one as he looked back 
upon it. The evening before, when the 


310 


UNITY DODGE. 


daily paper came, she had seen him pick 
it up, smooth it out carefully, hold it up 
to the light for a minute, and then with 
a sigh lay it down where John could find 
it when he came in. In these later years 
that one sheet had been nearly all the 
intercourse Dr. Dodge held with the great 
outer world and its doings. 

This evening Unity managed to make an 
interval of leisure ; and when the paper 
came, she asked cheerily, 

“ Shall I read it to you, father 

The worn face — it had grown worn — 
brightened a little : 

‘‘Yes, child, if you will. I don’t suppose 
the part you’ll want to read will be what I 
care most about hearing, but read what you 
please.” 

But Unity was pleased to read what she 
thought would interest him, and, as she 
could not trust herself to judge what that 
might be, the journal was read pretty thor- 
oughly. 

Bhoda seldom cared for reading, but there 
chanced to be a few items in the local news 
that arrested her attention also and aroused 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENS 311 

her to some animation. John saw it when 
he came in, and in his pleasure injudiciously 
commented upon it. 

“ Well, I shall have to lie here for nobody 
knows how long, and I must busy myself 
with something,” replied Rhoda, with the 
flush fading from her cheek and the impa- 
tient tears coming to her eyes ! “ Oh dear ! 

I am so tired of it all ! and I expect the 
house will all go to wreck and ruin while 
I am not able to be about.” 

The house was neither wrecked nor ruined 
in those days, but Unity found her hands 
filled with a multiplicity of duties that called 
for skill, unselfishness, constant thought and 
labor. Rhoda was not the most considerate 
of invalids. She had in some way felt, 
without ever really defining the feeling, that 
illness was a pitiable weakness, to be tolerated 
with a sort of good-natured condescension in 
some cases, but one to which she was far 
superior. Her robust health was a part of 
the capability of which she had always been 
proud. It had never even occurred to her 
that the world — her world — could possibly 
get on without her ; she did not believe it 


312 


UNITY DODGE. 


now. Still, it became evident, as the days 
slipped into weeks, that the doctor had been 
correct in his opinion, and Rhoda was forced 
to accept — as we all must accept, whether 
bravely or with bitter repining — the in- 
evitable. As the pain decreased she found 
herself helpless still, a prisoner between the 
narrow boundaries of bed and lounge. 

“Father Dodge, isn’t there anything I 
can do but just to lie here in the sitting- 
room all day and in my own room all 
night?” she asked, not very pleasantly, one 
day. 

“I don’t know as there is. Only,” he 
added, with a half-envious sigh, “ you have 
the use of your head and of your eyes.” 

That meant so much to him ! but Fhoda 
answered truthfully enough, though petu- 
lantly : 

“ I’ve always used my head to plan what 
work I would do, and there’s no good of 
doing that now; and my eyes seem to see 
more things that need doing than they see 
of anything else.” 

But her father’s words suggested a thought 
to Unity, and the next day she brought to 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENS 313 

the lounge some needles and an assortment 
of bright wools. 

“ Khoda, do you suppose you could man- 
age to show me the stitch of those little 
knit sacks for Baby?’’ she asked. ‘‘The 
evenings are beginning to grow cool, and 
he will soon need something to slip on over 
his dresses.” 

“ Yes, I suppose so. I don’t know when 
you will get it done, though. You never did 
knit very fast, and you haven’t much time 
now,” Bhoda answered, drearily. “Here! 
let me take the needles. I can start it more 
easily than I can show you.” With the 
work fairly in her hands, she grew inter- 
ested in it, and brightened visibly as her 
thoughts were drawn from herself. She knit 
a few rows, then dropped it to rest, but took 
it up again, and manifested no desire to 
relinquish it. 

When Unity, to test the success of her 
experiment, proposed to take the work, she 
received the not very gracious but decided 
answer : 

“What should I give it up to you for? 
There would be all the bother of your 


314 


UNITY DODGE. 


learning; and if I can do the first of it, 
I can do the last of it, I suppose — a little 
at a time.” So the work was left beside 
her, and little by little it grew, while, al- 
most against her will, she became more 
cheerful by doing it. 

Other kindred occupations followed, and 
the work-basket was established beside the 
lounge. Gradually — so gradually that the 
change was unperceived by herself — Rhoda’s 
brain followed the example of her fingers, 
and, debarred from old employments, sought 
new ones. From tolerating the daily read- 
ings — for which Unity contrived to make 
time— Ehoda slowly became an understand- 
ing, and so a more interested, listener. After 
that first evening Dr. Dodge had regularly 
brought the paper to his daughter, and from 
the paper the readings had been steadily 
branching in many directions. 

But all these things, with the household 
cares and the many demands of the two 
little ones, who were learning to run with 
their wants to ‘‘Aunt Una,” heavily taxed 
Unity’s strength and vitality. She was try- 
ing to do everything as Ehoda had done it. 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENS 315 

to keep all the wheels running in exactly 
the old familiar grooves, and she had neither 
Rhoda’s physical vigor nor her aptitude for 
the work. 

So Unity’s strength ebbed as the busy 
weeks passed. Overstrained nerves and 
muscles protested ; the nights found her too 
tired to think, almost to rest, and the morn- 
ings still weary and unrefreshed. At last 
her common sense called a halt. 

“ I may as well look at this fairly,” she 
said to herself one night. ‘‘ I cannot keep 
on in this way much longer. Somebody 
must do all these things, but I do not 
believe I am that somebody. I have been 
trying to do just as Rhoda did, and because 
she did it; which isn’t a very sensible reason, 
when one comes to look at it soberly. This 
time the pattern is too large for the cloth. 
A good strong woman could come in here 
and do with ease what is wearing me out, 
but of course we should have to pay her far 
more than we do little Jenny, and I suppose 
Rhoda would think that a ruinously extrav- 
agant proceeding. Well,” giving herself a 
little mental shake, ‘‘I am not trying to 


316 


UNITY DODGE. 


think Rhoda’s thoughts now, but my own. 
Perhaps I can do something else that would 
more than compensate for the extra expense, 
and that would be far better than trying to 
do what I am not able to do. If I could 
find something better to do — something that 
I am fitted for, and that will not take me en- 
tirely away from home and the duties here 
that really need me — ” She paused over 
that suggestion, and dropped into a deep 
study of its feasibility, with a silent prayer 
for wisdom and guidance. She was learn- 
ing that every turn in the road needs its 
heavenly guide-post, and to recognize such 
places with the petition, ‘‘ Whichever is 
thy way for me, lead me in it.” The study 
was a long one, but her brow cleared some- 
what at its close, and she said determinedly, 

I will try, but it is not worth while to 
propose anything to any one until I have 
something to propose.” 

So Unity went about her work as usual 
the next day, only hurrying it all out of the 
way as rapidly as possible, and in the after- 
noon, somewhat to Rhoda’s astonishment, 
started for the village. If she could obtain 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENT 317 

a position as assistant in the school there, or, 
if that were impossible, could secure pupils 
for a small select school, either would answer 
her purpose, she thought. She had decided 
to call upon several of her acquaintances for 
information and advice. 

The pleasant gray-haired pastor, who 
stood first on her list, was not at home, and 
Unity was sorely disappointed : she had 
counted much upon his interest. Besides, 
the project that had looked so promising the 
evening before wore a less hopeful aspect in 
broad daylight, when it must be put to a 
practical test. Despite her determination to 
be buoyant and persevering, her courage 
drooped as she slowly walked onward. 

A lady passed her with a quick, firm step. 
Unity was so absorbed in her own thoughts 
that for a moment she noticed nothing more 
than that it was a lady. Then a subtle con- 
sciousness that there had been something 
familiar in face or figure caused her to look 
after the retreating form. As she did so the 
other also turned for a backward glance, and, 
meeting Unity’s, paused, and with a sudden 
impulse retraced her steps. 


318 


UNITY DODGE. 


“I wonder if you are not the very one 
I want ?” she said, in an abrupt, eager way, 
more as if she were pondering the matter 
herself than speaking to another. 

“ I do not know. Miss Leonard,” Unity 
replied, surprised, but laughing at the odd 
remark and its questioning tone. 

Since that one miserable day in her child- 
hood when the tall, haughty girl had at- 
tempted to revise her toilet. Unity had al- 
ways remembered Margaret Leonard. They 
had met afterward at the village school, where 
Margaret had been among the older girls, 
a leader not only by virtue of her social 
position, but by her independence and self- 
poise. The intercourse between these two, 
therefore, had naturally been limited, and 
a year or two later Margaret had gone away 
to pursue her education elsewhere. Unity 
had occasionally seen her since — in the street 
or at some public assembly — but their ac- 
quaintance had been so slight that she was 
astonished not only at the peculiarity of the 
greeting, but at being addressed at all. 

Miss Leonard herself laughed as she real- 
ized her own abruptness. 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENP 319 

‘‘I beg your pardon. I believe I have 
a fashion of plunging into the middle of 
a subject and gathering up the ends after- 
ward,” she said. ‘‘ Have you any particular 
engagement? or can you walk with me for 
a few minutes until I explain?” 

“ I was only engaged in trying to find 
some one who might want me,” replied 
Unity. 

‘‘ Indeed ?” Her companion’s eyes turned 
steadily upon her to read her full meaning. 
“And I was trying to think of some one 
to help me — some one who could do it ; and 
when I passed you in the street, it flashed 
upon me that you might be exactly the one.” 
As she spoke she smiled from the height of 
her superior inches down into Unity’s face. 
She had grown more gracious in temper, 
more considerate in tone, since the old days, 
but there was still the same earnestness of 
purpose and direct, straightforward manner. 
She was never uncertain as to what she 
wanted either from herself or from others, 
and she explained concisely : “ I have been 
greatly interested in the Kindergarten work 
in the last year or two. I have been study- 


320 


VNITY DODGE. 


ing it abroad, and I want to open a school 
here at home. There is room and need for 
it. Don’t you think so ? The mere mention 
of the thing has brought me offers of pupils 
sufficient to begin with. But I want some 
one to help me in the work itself — some one 
in earnest, who will not take it up just as a 
passing fancy and drop it again as soon as 
the novelty is worn off. I never do things 
in that way myself. I can find plenty of 
young ladies who would go into raptures 
over it as a new amusement and think it 
‘so sweet!’ but I do not want them.” 

Unity’s eyes sparkled and her face flush- 
ed with pleasure. She well knew that Miss 
Leonard could command both patronage and 
influence in any such undertaking. 

“But I know nothing about the work 
practically,” she observed, regretfully. 

“That will not matter so much. I am 
sure you can learn it easily ; you have nat- 
ural aptitude for it, if you care to undertake 
it. Besides, I always liked you.” 

The last remark was added meditatively, 
honestly, as if it were the most natural thing 
in the world to say, though Unity, glancing 


“A DAMSEL CAME TO HEABKENJ^ 321 

swiftly into Margaret’s face, fancied that she 
scarcely knew she had made it. A long walk 
and a long talk followed. The scheme was 
fully explained, discussed and satisfactorily 
matured before they parted, and the pros- 
pective partners in the enterprise* far on 
their way to mutual acquaintanceship and 
cordial liking. 

Unity went home with lightened heart, 
though one difficulty still remained — ex- 
plaining the plan to her family and meet- 
ing the opposition she was sure would arise. 
She was not disappointed. Rhoda thought 
“ school-teaching might be well enough, but 
who would look after the work and every- 
thing that must be done?” Some people 
could manage all that nights and mornings 
and Saturdays, but she did not suppose Uni- 
ty could, as she seemed to think the work so 
hard when she had her whole time for it. 
As for hiring some experienced woman to 
come into the house, that would cost dread- 
fully and everything would be wasted. No 
woman would feel the same interest that one 
of the family did. When she — Rhoda — was 
about, she was always accustomed to doing 
21 


322 


UNITY JDODOE. 


this and this and this herself; she would 
trust it to no one else. 

“But you cannot be about now, Bhoda, 
and I cannot do it,” said Unity, decidedly. 
“ When you had charge of the house and 
work you managed it all in your own way, 
and now that it must all be in my hands it 
is only fair that I should have the same priv- 
ilege.” 

“ Yes ; that is true enough,” assented Dr. 
Dodge, lifting his head from its resting-place 
between his hands. He was beginning to 
notice and accept a great many things that 
his daughter said in these days. “ However 
badly you or any of us may feel about it, 
Bhoda, the fact remains that you are laid 
aside, and must be for a good while to come. 
It is wise to face it and make the best of it. 
Everything falls to Unity’s care now — house- 
hold expenses as well as the rest — and those 
of us who can’t help should not hinder. It 
is only fair that what she has to do she should 
be allowed to do in the way she thinks best.” 

“And I am sure I can do a good deal of 
it best by proxy,” added Unity, thankful 
for the plain statement of the case. “I am 


DAMSEL CAME TO HEARKENS 323 

not strong enough to do all the hard work, 
but I can do something else by which I can 
earn more than sufficient to pay some one 
who is strong enough ; which amounts to the 
same thing — or rather to a better thing, since 
it will leave me a surplus of money, strength 
and time which will be of advantage in other 
ways. I am trying to do my best, Rhoda, 
and that is all that I can do, though it may 
not be your best. We are not all alike. I 
suppose God did not mean that we should be, 
or he would have made us so.” 

Rhoda was silent. A year before, she 
would have contended that the real reason 
others could not do so much as she was be- 
cause they fancied they could not or wanted 
an easy time. But now she had found a 
reason quite beyond her own will and control 
why she could no longer do these things her- 
self. She reflected, also, that, as Unity would 
be away only three or four hours each day, 
she would still take the responsibility and 
oversight, besides having more time to spend 
in the room with her and with her father. 

This last was becoming a more important 
item of daily comfort than Rhoda acknowl- 


324 


UNITY DODGE. 


edged even to herself. Unity had studied 
much to find something fresh, entertaining 
and helpful, and had succeeded beyond her 
expectations with two auditors so unlike. 
But Dr. Dodge, as he depended more and 
more upon his daughter, was beginning to 
feel a new interest in whatever interested 
her. For Ehoda all interest in books was 
new — enforced at first, if such a thing can 
be, but growing more natural. She looked 
forward to the hours when Unity could be at 
leisure, and knew, without really questioning 
why, that they were the pleasantest of the 
day. Her study of this young sister-in-law, 
dropped in a great measure while Unity was 
away at school, began afresh now that they 
were together again, and with all the more 
in tent ness and avidity because in these weary 
days she could do little else but think and 
watch. She was listening to some voices in 
Unity’s life, and pondering them more deep- 
ly than any of her readings. After all, 
there might be a strength superior to the 
capacity to turn off work.” 

That evening Unity wrote a long letter to 
Cousin Lucre tia Gill. 


CHAPTEK XV. 

^ TFIF THAT THEY KNEW NOT” 

rpHE answer to that letter was a band-box 
-L and a bundle, a trunk and a box, and, 
most important of all, Lucretia herself — her 
veritable self ; for she seemed scarcely to 
have changed with the years. 

‘‘ Why didn’t you let me know you were 
coming ?” cried the delighted Unity. “ I 
would have met you at the station.” 

“I knew I could get myself out here,” 
said Lucretia, serenely, “ and I thought the 
best way to send you an answer was to bring 
it myself.” 

“I was so afraid you wouldn’t come!” 
laughed Unity, with the tears standing in 
her eyes. 

“I told you if ever you needed me to 
let me know,” replied Lucretia, calmly lay- 
ing off bonnet and wraps in her old room. 
“Dear me! This is homelike. But you 

325 


326 


UNITY DODGE. 


don’t look a bit more like the mite of a 
girl I left than — than you are like her; 
and I fancy that ain’t much.” 

Lucretia’s coming was a great relief to 
Unity. It secured at once both faithfulness 
and ability in the management of the house- 
hold and restored again the old guardian of 
her childhood. Dr. Dodge and John wel- 
comed her, and even Rhoda admitted that 
her coming was better than to have had a 
stranger — how much better she only learned 
slowly as the months passed by. 

Lucretia slipped naturally into old ways, 
and as far as possible freed Unity from all 
care. She was secretly both fond and proud 
of Unity — a feeling that seemed to have 
grown during her absence — and delighted in 
calling her, to herself, that girl I as good 
as brought up.” But she at once adopted 
little Jack and the baby, declaring that she 
‘‘should not know the old house if there 
were no children in it;” she could not get 
used to having “everybody grown up.” 

“ You see, I didn’t think I cared so much 
about this place when I was here — thought 
I was tired of it; but after I went away 


“5F A WAY THAT THEY KNEW NOT” 327 

nowhere else seemed homelike/’ she remark- 
ed to Unity one morning as she rinsed and 
shook out her dish-towels with the old vigor- 
ous snap. “I had it in my mind to come 
back and see you all before your letter came; 
and now, with Mrs. Dodge the way she is 
and you wanting to teach, we seem to sort 
of fit into one another’s needs. I don’t see 
why we shouldn’t get along toler’ble com- 
fortable, ’specially if everybody tries.” 

It seemed to Unity that everybody did 
try, and she, at least, was more than toler- 
ably comfortable. There was still care for 
her father and for Rhoda, but many old 
anxieties had resolved themselves into com- 
forts and old discords were hushed. 

The Kindergarten flourished from the first. 
Margaret Leonard was not one to undertake 
such a project without due deliberation or 
without having thoroughly fitted herself for 
it, and she had, moreover, as has been said, 
both friends and influence ; so from the first 
Unity had none of the solicitude attending 
a doubtful experiment. She liked the work 
and she liked Margaret — a mutual liking 
that, as they were brought into closer com- 


328 


UNITY DODGE. 


panionsbip day by day, was fast ripening 
into sincere friendship. 

Margaret often congratulated herself upon 
her selection. 

“ I should pride myself upon my intuitive 
perception — ‘ the dip of my divining-rod ’ — 
if I did not feel sure that Providence in- 
stead of any keenness of my own brought 
us together,’’ she said one day. “ I believe 
I have a certain sort of fitness for this 
work, Una, but you have positive genius 
for it. You seem to know instinctively what 
is needed, and you are not bound to the 
beaten tracks; you can originate methods 
of your own.” 

“I am glad they are my own,” laughed 
Unity. ‘‘I have been slow to learn to re- 
spect my own individuality. All my life I 
have wanted to be somebody else. I have 
envied and admired the rich ones, the sweet 
ones and the good ones, and have tried to 
be like them all in turn.” 

‘‘Been trying all your life to wear some 
other person’s ‘ bettermost cape’ and to feel at 
home in borrowed finery, have you?” laughed 
Margaret, for the first time betraying her 


“JBF A WAY THAT THEY KNEW NOT:’ 329 

remembrance of that luckless afternoon. 
“ Do tell me if I did really ruin that pre- 
cious horror beyond remedy?” 

“ No ; a few extra bows restored it to its 
pristine ugliness. Dear old Lucretia !” Uni- 
ty smiled at the memory, but with a serious- 
ness lurking under the smile as she added : 
“Yes, that is just what I have always been 
doing, Margaret — trying to make myself 
beautiful or useful with capes that would 
not fit. One of the first things I ever learned 
was the statement in the catechism that God 
made me, but it has ever since taken me to 
learn that God made me.” 

“Well, I am glad he did, and that you 
are yourself, and nobody else, in spite of 
your trying,” said Margaret. 

“ ‘ Dare to be right ; dare to be true : 

You have a work that no other can do/ ” 


she sang, playfully, looking back over her 
shoulder as she walked away. 

In Unity’s own home there were many 
things that “no other could do.” 

Ehoda admitted it wonderingly. 

“ I’m sure it never used to seem so. I 


330 


UNITY DODGE. 


wonder whether she is so changed? or am 
I ? Or is everything different ?” she mused 
one afternoon as she watched Lucretia vi- 
brating between the tea-table and the door, 
waiting for Unity to enter, while Dr. Dodge, 
with a book in his hand, paced to and fro 
through the room, pausing each time he 
reached the window and listening rather than 
looking for his daughter’s coming. — ‘‘Father,” 
said Ehoda, with a sudden thought, “ I 
might read that chapter Tor you with- 
out your waiting for her to come. My eyes 
are good enough, and I haven’t much else 
to do.” 

“ You ? If you will !” exclaimed the 
doctor, turning suddenly toward her, his 
surprise rapidly changing to gratification. 
“It is something I have read more than 
once, but there are two or three statements 
in it that I tried to recall to-day, and I 
could not exactly remember them.” 

Unity found them still busy with it on 
her return, Ehoda ensconced among the 
pillows of her lounge, her father beside 
her, his head bent to catch every word. 

Astonished but pleased. Unity marveled 


“ BY A WAY THAT THEY KNEW NOT’^ 331 

what had brought about such an unlooked- 
for occupation, and could not refrain from 
questioning a little afterward: 

“ Did the reading tire you, E-hoda ? I’m 
afraid you didn’t like it.” 

“Well, I don’t know any reason why 
I shouldn’t now and then do what I don’t 
like to do, as well as other people,” replied 
Ehoda ; and Unity received no further en- 
lightenment as to the origin of the proceed- 
ing and its motive. But, whatever it was, 
it so satisfied Bhoda that she repeated her 
offer, until it became a common occurrence 
for her to read to her father-in-law. 

“ To be sure, I don’t see much sense in a 
good deal of it, but I don’t suppose he sees 
any more in my wools and tidies,” she said, 
laughingly, one day. “We are neither of 
us good for much to anybody else, so we 
might as well humor each other.” 

But it would have been very unlike the 
old Bhoda to have said or thought such a 
thing. There was some change that had 
gone far deeper than the paler cheek, the 
more delicate hands and the softer eyes — 
something that was slowly transforming tone, 


332 


UNITY DODGE. 


word and spirit ; and, whatever she thought 
of the dryness and depth of the papers and 
books Dr. Dodge brought her, she was not 
tried by the subjects he once would have 
chosen. The mystical interpretations, the 
abstruse calculations, that had so absorbed 
him he seemed to have dropped — from 
necessity at first, undoubtedly, but later 
Unity fancied they had lost their attraction 
for him. When she read the Bible morning 
and evening, he never asked for the proph- 
ecies over which he had pored so long, but 
he listened to the Gospels almost as if they 
were to him a new story. Once, when he 
thought himself alone, she heard him re- 
peat the words she had read : 

‘‘ ‘ Precious stones, wood, hay, stubble’ — 
‘ the fire shall try every man’s work of what 
sort it is.’ Ah me! what rubbish we do 
build even on the true foundation I” he 
added, with a sigh. 

Unity, who trusted that the Comforter was 
bringing solace for the darkness that had 
fallen over his life, and that his evening 
hours would be cheered by new and better 
hopes than any the day had known, vainly 


A WAV THAT THEY KNEW NOTJ* 333 

watched to see his worn face brighten. It 
only grew graver and sadder day by day. 
He was very gentle, much quicker to notice 
the wishes and words of others than once he 
had been, but still saying little. The com- 
panionship of the children suited him. 
There was something pathetic in his patience 
with their countless demands, and he would 
sit on the porch in his arm-chair and rock 
these little ones to sleep, or wander about 
with them for hours when the weather was 
fine. But more and more frequently the gray 
head dropped into its resting-place between 
his hands, and his reveries grew longer. 

“ Now, I bdieve,” said Lucretia one bright 
autumn day, when her choicest cooking had 
failed to tempt his appetite, or even to win a 
smile of appreciation — “ I verily b’lieve that 
man is just a-pinin’ away over something 
that worries him. He says he ain’t sick, 
but it stands to reason something is the 
matter with him ; and somebody ought to 
find out what it is,” concluded she, with a 
glance at Unity. 

Unity greatly doubted her ability to learn 
anything further in the matter, and still 


334 


VNITY DODGE. 


more her power to aid even could she learn. 
Nevertheless, she made the attempt. 

“It is hard for you to give up all your 
own work and plans, isn’t it, father?” she 
asked, joining him where he sat in the sun- 
light. “Were you busy with something you 
are very sorry to leave undone ?” 

“More sorry for work that is done than 
for any of the kind you mean that is left 
undone, child,” he answered, slowly. “ God 
will not let us pierce the mysteries of heaven 
by any Babel-towers we can build. What 
was that you read the other day? ‘The 
secret things belong unto the Lord our God, 
but the things that are revealed to us and to 
our children — ’ Our children ! I haven’t 
given mine what belonged to them, child ; 
I have been so busy trying to pry into his 
secrets that I have lost sight of himself.” 

“ But he has not lost sight of you, father,” 
the girl ventured to answer. 

“Ay, I know it; I have learned that 
also.” His head dropped wearily on his 
hands. “But, child, the more sure I grow 
of that, the more I see how unlike — ” He 
lifted his head and suddenly turned his dim 


A WAY THAT THEY KNEW NOT:’ 335 

eyes toward her. ‘‘ If ever the Lord can 
forgive — Yet how shall I meet my boy’s 
mother and tell her ? My boy ! I do not 
know where he is, body or soul.” 

“ Safe and well,” said Unity’s glad voice. 
“ Father, I know ; I can tell you.” 

It was such a happy story to tell! and 
at last the old man understood it all 
and murmured brokenly : 

‘‘Now, of all God’s goodness, can any- 
thing be greater than this — that he saves 
us from our own undoing?” 

John and Rhoda learned the tidings be- 
fore the evening was over, and sincerely and 
heartily entered into the rejoicing, with no 
stricture upon the past. 

Lucretia looked after the old doctor that 
evening as he passed out of the room and re- 
marked with an emphatic nod of her head : 

“Well, I do b’lieve the coming of the 
Lord is nigher to this house, at least, than 
it was when the doctor was so sure about it.” 

As Thanksgiving drew near there was an 
unwonted stir in the old farmhouse. Warren 
and Eeub were coming, and Lucretia had 


336 


UNITY BODGE. 


earnest consultations with Mrs. John on the 
subject of cookery; for she and Lucretia were 
becoming good friends and coworkers. As 
Lucretia herself explained it, Folks always 
do get nearer to one another when they get 
nearer to the Lord.” That was, in truth, 
the summing up of all the changes which 
made that Thanksgiving day such a happy 
one. 

Unity, thinking it all over that night, would 
willingly have changed places with no one. 

“ I’m glad to be here in my own place,” 
she whispered — “myself, with my own work, 
my own dear ones, my own burdens and 
blessings which God has given me. How 
slow I have been to learn it — to live my own 
life and make the most and the best of it 
without trying to make it another’s !” Her 
father’s religion, from which she shrank; 
Fhoda’s smartness, which she could not 
imitate ; Flora’s goodness, which was so 
imperfect at last, — all these, and many more, 
had bewildered and misled her. She had 
blundered among her many patterns. 

“ Christ alone is our Pattern,” Unity said, 
softly. 



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